Article on eBay Price Increase

January 14, 2005 - 10:41AM
SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) -- Some small business owners who reach most of their customers via eBay Inc. expressed anger Thursday at the online auction giant's plan to boost the monthly fee it charges sellers by 60 percent. Its shares lost nearly 4 percent.

EBay outlined the increase in a terse e-mail on Wednesday to all buyers and sellers, including small business owners who hawk clothing, electronics and other low-margin commodities.

"It seems as though the larger eBay becomes, the more greedy they become," said Lynette McDonald of Alton, Ill., who has sold Barbie and baby clothes on eBay since 2001. She says she may close her eBay store entirely because of the fee hikes or raise prices she changes buyers.

Starting Feb. 18, eBay said the monthly subscription fee for people who operate "Basic eBay Stores" will increase from $9.95 to $15.95.

The fee for a standard listing of 10 days will double, from 20 cents to 40 cents.

"This site used to be a place where one could get a good deal," McDonald said. "Now that the starting prices on goods are higher to accommodate the growing fees incurred, there are no more deals to be had.

Such reactions underscore the popularity eBay has achieved with small business owners who can't create their own Web sites or operate a traditional bricks-and-mortar establishments. Peddling vintage china, handmade sweaters, classic cars and other collectibles on eBay generates supplemental income for senior citizens, rural Americans and others who live far from commercial hubs.

EBay spokesman Hani Durzy declined to discuss how the price hikes would affect revenue at the San Jose, Calif.-based company, which reported sales of $805.88 million in the first three quarters of 2004. The company will report fourth-quarter earnings on Wednesday.

"We believe the price changes are the right thing to do to ensure the continued success of the marketplace," Durzy said. "Ultimately that's good for the entire community of buyers and sellers.

The changes, combined with eBay's dominance in the auction and online payment sectors, prompted some members to ask whether the government or a fair-business consortium should regulate fee structures so small-scale entrepreneurs don't get gouged.

"Yes, it is a free market and sellers can take their business elsewhere, but there is very little competition for this style format," said Artie Klawans, an art dealer in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.

http://www.wwmt.com/engine.pl?station=wwmt&id=13692&template=breakout_surfing.html

 

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It seems to me that the answer is real simple. As collectors and dealers we need to move our business to other sites. The dealers should advise their collectors what site they will be using and the collector should use the new site instead of Ebay.

catman

 

New Site

As I remember just a few days ago one of our members listed a new site specializing in coins. Perhaps we should put that link on this thread as well.

Follow up I found it - What do others think of this site????
http://www.moneybucks.net/catalog.asp?catid=8349

Richard

 

I agree with catman. Altho these added fees does not effect what I sell on ebay, I mainly use 7-day listings, and do not have a "store" per say. Finding other auctions on the internet are handy now. For example, the gent here uses moneybucks, yahoo I believe has auctions availiable, ubid, I typed "auctions coins" on a search engine and got dozens of hits, it is just a matter of picking which you wanna use--As for those using ebay, all these store owners gotta do to bring down ebays snoby ways is threaten ebay that if they do not roll back these exorbitant fees increase, they will close shop and move there store to ebays competition, I read some place already that ebays stock has dropped a few ticks on stock market because of these increase--So looks to me that it's already touching there earnings--

 

The biggest increase is in the Final Value Fee for store sales...bumped up to 8%. Then there's the increase in gallery fees and Buy It Now fees. If these fees don't directly affect you as a seller, don't worry. The next group of increases surely will.
I've closed my ebay store and will stop using gallery. Buy It Now I've only used sporadically anyway.
Funny how ebay pushes things for awhile then BAM raises prices. They pushed gallery HARD when it was new, and the push on stores was overwhelming. Buy It Now, too.
Isnt' that how crack dealers work also?
Nick

 

I thought Ebay and crack dealers were the same already....? Shows what I know.

catman

 

Your store

Trader it was good to meet you at the Coin show
can you email me your website or if rules allow post it here?
Richard

 

Under each of Nick's posts, you will see a blue oval box, with "www" written in it.
Click on the box, and it will take you to his website.

 

Richard,

It looks as though it might work for foreign coins but I don't see a section for domestic United States.

catman

 

Let's start one

It will work for US coins if we support them,
by the way even they do not have any Australian coins.
Richard

 

Richard it was good to meet you, too. I'm glad you stopped by to say hi.
Regarding my site...I feel compelled to apologize...it's very dusty since I never update it anymore. I'm working on a facelift for it and hope to have that done by summer.
Nick

 

HEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

"We believe the price changes are the right thing to do to ensure the continued success of the marketplace," Durzy said. "Ultimately that's good for the entire community of buyers and sellers."
And, if you believe that, I have a really nice bridge to sell.....

 

I got ur pm susanlynn, should we not post ur site suggestion in here also for all to see? if we can post moneybucks and ebay why not your suggestion??

 

I am checking out yahoo auctions. You can get some good deals right now. If you are a seller the fees are not bad.

http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/auct/afee/afee-02.html

 

I've said this before, but it's still true.

I just ran my standard searches on Ebay and Yahoo. There are 1,538 auctions for me to check out on EBay, and 73 on Yahoo. I know from experience that 25% of the Yahoo auctions are for supplies, even though they are listed under coins.

Could that be the main reason my total EBay feedback is more than 10 times as high as my Yahoo feedback, ya think?

At this moment Yahoo - which is far and away the second largest flea market website - has 18,865 auctions listed under coins, and EBay has 183,345. If you really want to buy coins at on-line auction sites, do you have much of a choice?

 

Well put! Sad, but true.

 

Here's an alternative to Ebay; www.wangledcoins.com .

 

Hey, I've placed an order with my broker to sell my EBay stock as soon as the market opens in the morning. There's an alternative boasting 195 book auctions and 23 others (zero coins).

How can it possibly fail to knock EBay off it's pedestal?