This Week's Finds

I have been slack with my blogging this week - but now it's Saturday which I consider my day off.   I have had lunch with the parents, and Mum has some new tiny people clothing to de-stain.   :-)


This week has been a good one in sales - but I'll talk about them tomorrow.    I have found a few interesting things.  I have gone out of my comfort zone and bought some children's toys.  Not little ones - but great big honking ones that run on batteries.  I don't even want to think about packing them for postage, and I haven't even tested these to see if they work, and I certainly haven't looked at the completed's for these.  They sit in the corner mocking me, but I am determined to get through my mountains of unlisted Videos and Books that have been there for anywhere up to 6 months.


Here they are.  These ones costed me $1 each.

This little thing costed me 50 cents.   No books with it unfortunately.

I pounced on this.  It screamed retro-80s at me.  It costed me $3.  When I did some research, I realised that there is supposed to be a booklet that it comes with that actually allows you to *use* the blasted thing.   It just beeps and flashes and me when I press the buttons and I'm beginning to wonder if it would fit down the loo.  Not sure if it's worth putting up on its own.

I saw this and it was New in the Box, so I forked out $3.    When I got home and pressed the "Try Me" button all I heard was the sound of crickets, and some choice swear words.  I've never heard of this show.   I don't want to take it out of the packaging to test it.    I will probably regret buying this one.

Yay, yay!  I snapped this one up.  The Nightmare game is a good seller, and even though I forked out $4, I know I can get at least $20 for this.   This one is in very good condition, so maybe more.

At $2 I couldn't go past the 2000 Sydney Olympics Edition Scrabble.    This is also in nice condition.

When I was at my Salvos this morning, I saw this game and passed it by - because it was $5.   All their games are $5 or more and they are NEVER half price.   *grumble grumble*.     I thought I'd go home and research it first - my purse has been on a severe diet lately!     Well, then I found these in the completeds:

Aarrgghh!  That's what I get for being a tight-wad.   And you know I will be scuttling back there on Monday morning when they re-open.  Did I place that game at the bottom of the pile, and put others games on top to hide it?   *looking shifty*   Maybe I did ... Maybe I didn't.     (Hint:  I did   ;-))


I found this little iron trivet  - 50 cents - isn't he just gorgeous!!  This one is not leaving the house.  He will look nice sitting up against the wall on the kitchen bench.  I will NOT be placing hot things on his little birdy face.

Those were the only interesting things I got apart from more books and videos.  I had some interesting sales, and I will share them with you tomorrow - with perhaps some more information on what videos to look for.   I love videos now, they are boosting my sales figures.  I'm not sure if kids toys will be my forte, but I am dipping my toe in the pond.  It's a little tepid.   :-p

Old VHS Videos - Trash or Treasure?

Old VHS Videos - Trash or Treasure?

For those of us *ahem* old enough to remember the old VCRs - ah, what joy they brought.   Wiggly lines on the screen - rented videos you got that hadn't been rewound properly.   Shoving the darn thing in and hitting rewind and listening to that whirring sound that seemed to go on forever.   Surely the tape couldn't be that long???

Those days are long gone - or are they?    Videos are making a return to the wanted list.  People are hunting them down for those movies that never made it to DVD.    They are buying kids videos in bulk for their little darlings to sit hypnotised in front of and gain some precious quiet time.    

Videos are getting hard to find.  Op shops are beginning to re-think stocking them.     I went to my local St Vinnies the other day and saw a sign on the window ~ "We are no longer accepting video tapes."    Well no wonder - they had them priced at $1 to $3 a tape - that's why they never sold them.    Some op shops virtually give them away - they know few people have VCRs now.   Others are overpricing them and wondering why their shelves are filled with dusty video tapes - this makes them want to trash them entirely from their stock - this is NOT a good thing.

I visited my local op-shop the other day and found a nice haul of videos.  They only charge 10 cents here - they've moved into a smaller premises and no longer have the space to store towering piles of videos - they are pricing them to get rid of them.    I like!!!     I got these 20 videos for a total cost of $2.   

As I was walking out with my haul, one of the ladies who worked there said "You're a regular, and nobody else seems to want videos - why don't you look in this box, there's a pile of videos I'm throwing into the bin.   Have a look through and take what you want."


Woohoo!  How could I say no - I scrabbled through that box and saved these precious gems from the jaws of death:

Another 11 videos in all.  That's a total of 31 videos for $2.  Sweet!  


 Videos are hard work - because you don't know if they work properly when you buy them.  That's why I only buy them dirt cheap.   If I buy a video and it doesn't work - I recycle the paper cover insert, and keep the plastic container (if its clean and intact) as part of my replacement stock.  The tape gets binned.  I don't want someone else buying a tape that doesn't work, and I don't want to end up picking it up and buying it again myself.


I have piles of videos around the house waiting to go up on Ebay.  I bought a Video player from an op-shop for $5 - and during the day, if I remember, I put a pile of videos in front of the unit, and hit the play button.  I let the video run a while (about 10-20 minutes) and peek in every now and then.  If the video is running smoothly without any wiggly lines and the sound is good - I put a little coloured sticker on the cover to show that I've tested it and then it goes up onto Ebay.


What kind of videos do I look for?   I've learnt the hard way - hit and miss.   I researched the videos that were selling.  I looked at the two largest video sellers on Ebay, and checked out what was selling.   I learnt the ones that can go for surprising amounts, and the ones that are a sure-fire seller.  I still have so much to learn.


Here are some choice videos from my purchased lot.  Why did I choose these in particular?   These videos fit in with part of my Hit List for videos:


Trashy Action Videos - Rated R a Plus!   Look at these beauties.  Aren't you just dying to see the fantastic acting, hear the awesome dialogue,  and enjoy the well-rounded characters in these?    Look, they are both Rated R.  These are so trashy, there's a great chance they didn't make it onto video.   There are people that collect these crappy action-filled movies!   I get them even if the cover is a little shoddy, or they are ex-rental.  It's worth the risk.   Both these babies were in the to-be-trashed box.  Can't imagine why.  (*snigger*)

Appalling 1970s/80's Science Fiction :   These two were also saved from the jaws of death.  Hands up who thinks these movies are probably so awesome - people were screaming for them to be put onto DVD.   Uh-huh.  Thought so.

Any Trashy Horror - Rated R a Big Bonus +  :   Lookee at these.  I'm pretty sure Toxic Avenger is on DVD, but I got it anyway as it's a Director's Cut edition.  My ex forced me to look at that frickin' movie many times.   Believe me, it's pure projectile-vomit material.   In any movie like these - you can be sure a woman or two or three will be getting their titties out for no apparent reason.  They are awesomely craptastic.

Any Music Videos - especially 80s/90s/heavy metal/punk  :   For those of you lucky enough not to have heard John Farnham in the 80s/90s - himself and his mullet "serenaded" us for many years in Australia.   There are FANS still out there - they want to revisit the music of their youth, no matter how atrocious it really is.   

Sports of any kind - especially older matches.    Our football season doesn't start for a couple of months yet.   All the meat-heads   yobbos   sports-loving-men are itching to watch men chase balls around - They live for it.  Yes, it's exciting and if the one wearing the right coloured jumper kicks a goal - tiny minds are easy to please.    This works with soccer and rugby as well.  We have a lot of English ex-patriots here and they want to look at men chasing different shaped balls into different shaped goal-posts.  Go with what works for your country / state / customer IQ.

Crappy adventure movies - from 80s/90s.   A couple more saved from the jaws of death.  What do we have here - a Chuck Norris movie.  Chuck is awesome - he's a legend, he's a symbol - what can't he do?  (hint:  act).    And here we have Gary Busey and his teeth in a wonderful Rated R video.   I'm getting all warm and fuzzy just thinking about what's inside these ones.

Other trashy videos :  these are ones I've gotten from personal experience, or gut instinct, or just because I'm a bit pervy.   Traps is a HTF Aussie movie - I've sold a copy before, I think I got $15 for it.    Tale of a Vampire - it's got vampires, it's got JULIAN SANDS.  Anything he's in is bad and sleazy (except Warlock, one of my all-time favourite films).   

Julian Sands is naughty and gorgeous and he's just dishy as a bad man, and his lovely English accent .....   Oh, am I still gushing .....??   Pardon my drool.






Well, that was my reasoning behind these videos.  I hope you learnt something from my choices - even if it's just that I'm crazy. 


 Keep an eye out on the video piles and grab anything that makes you think "Eeeeek!" or "Who the hell would want to look at that?"   It's a sure-fire thing!  There's a lot of weirdos on this planet, and we all know a great percentage of them shop on Ebay.   ;-)

I am drowning in clothing ....

I am drowning in clothing .....   Children's clothing - and I have no children.

In my last post, you saw how I had snaffled a large amount of clothing for a good price.
I've gone through them all, and given them the sniff test and the eyeball test.    Then I have a very small pile of clothes to clean - only about 8 items.   Normally, only about 25% (at the very most) of the clothes I get from op shops need cleaning.  Most people (like me) always clean their clothes before donating.  It saves me a lot of time and effort.

I have a secret to preparing the clothes for sale.    They end up white where they're supposed to be ...  and stain-free, smelling nice, and ironed so flat you could skate on them.  They're like something from a laundry detergent ad.

This here, is my iron.

And here is my clothes line...

Oops, I forgot to mention, I don't have an iron, or an ironing board - and I've never used my clothesline, because I would have to battle weeds and ant nests to get to it.

But I have a secret to getting my clothes especially clean and ironed - that require me NOT needing these things.  

Here is my big secret:

Yep - that's my Mum.  She is a freak about ironing!  When I was a kid she ironed all day.  I'm one of four children so there was lots of clothing to keep her going - she even ironed socks and undies and would have ironed me if I had sat still long enough.

I have lunch with Mum & Dad every Saturday. One of the questions my Mum always asks is "Do you have any clothes for me?"  She grabs that bag of clothes with glee.   She craves it - she is salivating for those dirty clothes.  The bigger the stain, the better - she wants them to be nasty so she can battle them.  The next week she shows me the spotless item and talks about how she soaked it in napisan and did some voodoo stuff on it, then ironed the crap out of it and - there they are - the magical clean clothes.    What would I do without her?  She's awesome.  :-)

Yes, I did think for many years as a child that I had been adopted, and this is only one of the many many reasons why.


This is the bottom of my wardrobe.   This is all kids clothes for Ebay, and this is only one side of my robe:

I have them all in plastic bags sorted by Size and Boy/Girl clothes:

Yep, I've definitely got enough Size 1 Girl's clothes to put a Bulk Lot on ebay - must pull my finger out.   I would love to store the clothes in plastic containers, but basically they are either so large they won't fit in the wardrobe, or so small they don't hold enough of the clothes to separate the sizes.

I am gradually moving to these cute little stripey bags with the zipper on the top:

To keep a track of all these little people clothes that have invaded my house, I keep a notebook with tabs for size and Boy/Girl.  I add the new clothes as they come in, and note any marks or things that need to be mentioned in the listing.

I use Auctiva for my listings, and I keep an updated draft for each size boy/girl clothing listing and update them every week.     Then when there's a lot ready to go, all I need to do is take the photos and we're done.

Here's one of my current listings :
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120844030162&ssPageName=STRK:MESE:IT


This clothing stuff is all new to me.   I got interested in branching out into other things by my lovely, friendly, and very helpful mates on Ebay Underground.    They were buying interesting clothes (and other things) at low prices, and selling them for a good profit.       I got interested - I started looking at clothes in my op shops.     I wanted to get some clothes and have them sit in my store for 5 cents a pop until someone snaffled them up for a great price.

Then I hit a brick wall.  I realised that though the dream was great,  Ebay Australia is a completely different animal to Ebay USA or Canada.

I have a basic store - I pay $19.95 a month.

For this I can list books, CDs, Videos and DVDs for 5 cents each.  These are my specialties - these are my bread and butter.   For clothes or anything else I would have to pay a whopping  40 cents per Buy It now Listing.

Whoaahhhhh!  That's a big sucking hole in my profits there.   What if I upgraded my store to the next level up - for a mere $99.95  for a Featured Store.  What savings will I make now in fees?  Lots surely???

Bwahahahahahhahahahhhhaaaa!!!  Sorry, I just choked a bit then.

Wow - then I only have to pay 30 cents per listing.   Ummm - no thanks.

But I mean - what the hell?  Are those fees an incentive to pay nearly $100 per month just to have a store.  Really?   Are there monkeys running Ebay Australia?   (Actually monkeys would probably do a better job - cudos to those monkeys).

That throws the clothing range sold as single items out of my ball park.   I truly never see anything special that I can buy at a decent price here - and certainly never anything new with tag.   My cash for ebay stock is dismally small.   With all I'm learning at Ebay Underground, I'm getting better, but I'm still doing baby-steps.

As long as my local op shop sells the cheap kiddies clothes - I'll stick with my bulk lots.  (Their adult clothes are a bit ho hum - not worth selling on their own - and I really don't want to suck up those big listing fees).  It's a lot of work to do bulk lots, but it's fun to fill a bag of clothes and make my little numbered bags sorted by size (oh dear, I'm sounding a bit anal now ...) ,    and the sale when it happens is a nice amount in my otherwise lowly-priced items.

I said in my last blog I would talk about my videos that I got on my last op shop trip and give some pointers on selling them - this will have to wait until tomorrow now, I got carried away here.   :-)

The monkeys made me do it.

This is my first step into the cyber-world of blogging, please hold my hand as I waddle with baby-steps and let you see into my unsocial world.

Today, I went to my local op-shop (thrift shop to my overseas friends).  It is not affiliated with just one charity, but all proceeds goes to my local community & charities (Fire Brigade, State Emergency Services, local Animal Shelters and more).  Not only is this shop mega-cheap and clean - the ladies who work there are super-nice and work very hard.  I go there every week and they know me well.

The op-shop is located in a small house and the rooms are tiny.   Each room holds different clothing types - men's, women's, babies, children and larger-size women's clothing.    You fill a plastic bag with clothes for $5.   If you roll them up - you can fit a lot of clothes in one bag.  If there is one other person in the room it can become quite a wrestle with lots of "excuse me's" and quite astonishing feats of contortionism.  I also find it helpful to sharpen my elbows to ward off the grabbers - those ones that sidle up to you, and grab something from the rack right in front of your face!

I was innocently perusing the ladies nighties rack, when I noticed this shady character lurking in the corner.   I call him "Shane", after that great nob - Shane Warne.

Yes, there he was with his pants around his ankles - there were some nice silky nighties there, but there is no need for that kind of behaviour sir!

I kept one beady eye on him as I went through the racks.  I even found a few tops for myself - usually they are all too tiny or too large.   I haven't tried them on yet, but try them on later and hope that they'll fit me just fine and won't gape between my boobs to let the fresh air in, or lovingly strangulate my love handles.

I crept out the room - but as I did - Shane (pervy guy) "winked" at me.   Ewww.  I hope he made use of the small toilet and washed his hands later, the filthy thing.

Then I hit the children's room - filled with clothes for babies and younger kiddies.    It's a small room - with one rack low and one rack high up.   Now I'm vertically challenged, so I find having to reach up about 10cm above my head to shuffle through clothing is quite an effort.  I am sure in a few more months I will have one over-muscley shoulder and RSI in one arm.

I scored big with the kids stuff. There was lots of ultra-cute clothes - especially for girls.  Apart from the 4 tops for me - I filled 2 plastic bags with kiddies clothes.   That costed me a total of $10 - for what turned out to be 40 items of clothing - that's 25 cents an item.  Not bad, aye?

Here is a look at the pile of kids clothes I got:

Amongst them were these cute little skirts:

And these cute little dresses ...

I wish I could fit into the denim dress here :-) :

So, what happens now - I have a great honking pile of children's clothes, and nowhere to put them (certainly there are no children to put them on) ????

Did I mention that I also have bags of kids clothes in my closet?   There is no room for my own clothes, my clothes are of secondary importance as the *don't make me any money* !!

How do I sort through these cute (and sometimes very grotty) items of clothing, and what's the next step in getting these)  organised and clean enough to sell on Ebay.   What's my secret for getting these clothes clean and ironed??

Stay tuned.  I will answer this question and also talk about the video-stravaganza I found in the bric-a-brac section of the same op-shop.



Coming up, I will ponder life's great mysteries, such as:

~ Who the hell voted for Matt Damon as sexiest man in the world?

~ Are red-heads really going to be extinct - and should I feel guilty for not breeding and keeping them out of zoos?

~ How come men go all child-like in their old age and their bums disappear?   And how come women's bums triple in size, and they learn the delight of growing a beard/moustache combo?   I'd better start looking at some facial hair styling that will suit my face shape.  That old Big M is looming !!!