Ebay Fees
Lot's of stuff written about Ebay's fees lately. It's hard to know what it all means. What is useful and what is just noise. Is Ebay milking it's sellers or just making increases the way successful and powerful businesses do all the time? The kind of businesses investors want to own.
Will lots of Ebay sellers go out of business or just make less? Plenty of questions, fear and anger floating around.
I have an Ebay store and have been making a decent profit on a monthly basis for about two years. What do the fee increases mean to me and how have I managed? I felt betrayed and was not happy about the increases but I don't think they are fatal, at least not yet. I did make a change in the way I view my relationship with Ebay and how I will manage my store and relationship going forward. I won't list as many fixed price listings as before because they cost a lot and are a crap shoot . Store listings are the way to go for now. They are much cheaper. Sales have not dropped as a result of this although I expected they would and they may, going forward.
I will continue to use Ebay as one avenue but have resolved to be less dependent and less devoted as a result of the fee increases. This whole community participation, feel good, member aspect has been demolished. This is the big change for me and I am probably better off to understand the reality. Now rather than later. This is straight up capitalism. It is fine, the best system there is so far, except that we must know the game we are in to have a chance to make the right decisions. There is no such thing as community , devotion, favors, friends, free time, free stuff, etc. Ebay does what is best for it's business and you must do what is best for yours.
For now it is viable channel for me and they do offer a lot of good things. The order management system is very easy and convenient, the traffic is monstrous, the feedback profile is a very valuable tool and on the whole the system just plain works. Sort of a miracle when all is considered. Use it and negotiate the best you can. Ebay is not a friend but a worthy adversary. One last action. I bought some of the common stock in the company as a hedge. If they put my store out of business with more fee hikes I hope to get it back at the other end through the increase in the share price. It also makes it a little easier to pay the higher fees.
