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Ina Steiner is co-founder and Editor of EcommerceBytes and has been reporting on ecommerce since 1999. She's a widely cited authority on marketplace selling and is author of "Turn eBay Data Into Dollars" (McGraw-Hill 2006). Her blog was featured in the book, "Blogging Heroes" (Wiley 2008). She is a member of the Online News Association (Sep 2005 - present) and Investigative Reporters and Editors (Mar 2006 - present). Follow her on Twitter at @ecommercebytes and send news tips to ina@ecommercebytes.com. See disclosure at EcommerceBytes.com/disclosure/.
Little by little the smaller seller is dying, one raise at a time
I have probably 1500 in good auto parts and related items in my garage. I have no longer a place to sell this stuff. eBay buyer(s) are now programmed to scam you thanks to eBay themselves. Even my dad got a hot check from a buyer. The days for the common man are over on eBay. I hope they fold and go BK. Some company needs to wipe then off the face of the Earth with a new model.
And these associated costs get passed right on to the buyer (as it should be)
Sadly eBay et al use a sellers shipping as some kind of profit center (and let’s temporarily skip how somehow they are justified to do so – they aren’t) and when the carriers raise prices – it’s free wings for all over at walkers, and free fry cleaning over at Amazon
Sellers should add a surcharge themselves ON eBay – but one way TOS’s make it impossible
Etsy is going to kill their site by continually raising fees. 6.5% plus .20 to list or relist every 4 months, plus processing fees, plus you sold too much forced advertising penalty, plus charging the final value fee on sales tax collected, the average seller is now spending 20-30% of the sale on fees. Not very seller friendly.