KEH gives low lowball offer on my Gitzo GT5561SGT

[Leigh]

One factor that nobody has mentioned is timing.

When a customer goes to a retail/online store to purchase something, it's at a time of his choosing.

When you try to sell a one-off, you're setting the timing, which dramatically reduces your customer pool.

Neither ebay prices nor retail prices constitute valid price points if you're trying to sell something NOW.

Ebay prices are only a valid indicator for common items, not for unusual, scarce, or unique items.
A couple of years ago I saw a $100 radio sell on ebay for over $4,000 due to a bidding war between two idiots.

- Leigh

[Brian Ellis]

KEH attends the camera shows, in the spring and fall,here in the DFW metroplex to purchase used equipment.

I have sold several pieces of old photo equipment to them at these shows.

It's been my experience that they pay more for a piece of used equipment when they can examine it in person before buying.

The KEH phone estimators cannot actually see what they are purchasing. Therefore, the low ball bids.

Unless KEH has changed since I sold to them, there's no difference between selling at a show and selling by mail. Either way they examine the item before committing to a price. Their telephone price is (or was back when I sold) just a conditional offer based on the seller's description of the item's condition. Final price wasn't set until they received the item and examined it. In my case that dropped their telephone offer of something like $300 to $50 despite as accurate a description of the items' condition as I could give (no point in puffing the condition, they're going to see the item before they buy it). When I asked what their problem was with the condition they were vague and said something like "it just isn't what we thought it would be."

This was in 1994, back when Shutterbug was the main vehicle for individuals selling used photo equipment to other individuals. And that was a real PITA way to sell - write the ad, send it in, wait two months for it to appear and probably another couple weeks at best before you had your money. I suspect that sales to places like KEH were much more common back then than they are today just because selling to other individuals was such a long, drawn out process.

All of which is one minor reason why I'd never again sell to KEH or any other retailer (the main reason of course being the wholesale price). Once you ship to them they have you by the short hairs. You don't want to pay to have it shipped back and you don't want to go through the same thing all over again with another buyer. Plus that immediate cash is tempting. All of which probably causes some sellers to accept offers from places like KEH even though they think the price is low.

[Brian Ellis]

Sounds like nobody here has to sell merchandise for a living. KEH needs to at least DOUBLE their investment and turn it over in a short period of time to make business work..salaries and commissions come from profit...

Very true - a retailer who buys used equipment and pays anything close to retail for it won't be in business very long.

[Brian Ellis]

Probably a lot of it come from dead photographers' estates. What else is an ignorant family going to do with it?

That's probably one source. They used to also get a lot of their stuff from newspapers - the paper would replace all its cameras, lenses, etc. at one time and rather than trying to sell each item of the old stuff piece-meal to individuals they'd just ship it all to KEH. Probably still true today with digital gear.

[dh003i]

One factor that nobody has mentioned is timing.

When a customer goes to a retail/online store to purchase something, it's at a time of his choosing.

When you try to sell a one-off, you're setting the timing, which dramatically reduces your customer pool.

Neither ebay prices nor retail prices constitute valid price points if you're trying to sell something NOW.

This is interesting and these kinds of posts -- and several interesting ones above -- are why I started this thread. Regarding timing a 7-day sale window, that certainly seems like it would be an issue in terms of narrowing down your customer pool. However, don't some sellers list items for 30 days? I've seen some items on eBay that go on for a long time? I think they're usually buy-it-nows. The fees for relisting items, especially if you put reserve prices on them, would add up, however.

Of course, For Sale listings here on LF.info have an essentially infinite window, at least for anyone curious enough to ask if the item is still for sale. The problem with selling by forums is in terms of buyer-risk, which limits the buyer pool as well.

Ebay prices are only a valid indicator for common items, not for unusual, scarce, or unique items.
A couple of years ago I saw a $100 radio sell on ebay for over $4,000 due to a bidding war between two idiots.

I bet the winner reneged, at least if they had any common sense*. Sometimes you also see very highly valued things selling way below what you'd expect the price to be, as well, and reneges there wouldn't surprise me either.

* Speaking of not having common sense, I've actually taken some losers satisfaction in some of the auctions I've lost, that I made the winning bidder pay more money than they otherwise would have.

[Leigh]

I bet the winner reneged, at least if they had any common sense.

It's a dollars and sense issue. Far too many people have more dollars than sense.

If the bidder had any sense he wouldn't have gotten into the bidding war in the first place.

- Leigh

[dh003i]

Looking at Amazon's used marketplace, their fee structure may be better for those wanting a large selling window for a high-end rare/unusual item:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/seller/sell...s&ld=AZFSSOAAS
https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/...emID=200336920

but you'd have to be a professional seller ($40/mo) to create an item not in their catalog.

[toolbox]

This is interesting and these kinds of posts -- and several interesting ones above -- are why I started this thread. Regarding timing a 7-day sale window, that certainly seems like it would be an issue in terms of narrowing down your customer pool. However, don't some sellers list items for 30 days? I've seen some items on eBay that go on for a long time? I think they're usually buy-it-nows. The fees for relisting items, especially if you put reserve prices on them, would add up, however.

Of course, For Sale listings here on LF.info have an essentially infinite window, at least for anyone curious enough to ask if the item is still for sale. The problem with selling by forums is in terms of buyer-risk, which limits the buyer pool as well.

I have a small ebay business dealing in camera gear (mostly old 35mm but a little medium and large format). I pretty much never use listings over 30 days, as it removes the time pressure for a buyer. I see an awful lot of overpriced stuff on 30 day (or longer) listings hoping for that "magic someone" with a big wallet to buy it. I'd rather ask a realistic price and actually sell it . There's also the psychological factor that if it's been for sale forever, it must not be any good or worth what's being asked (or someone else would have already bought it). I try to use BIN rather than auction style listings as the fees are a LOT lower, and I pretty much always know the value of what I'm selling. Ebay tries to get people to use auction listings (with free insertion) because they get a lot more from final value fees. If it's something odd/unusual, I just make up a price I'd be happy to live with. A lot of the stuff I get comes from estates it seems like. A lot of it looks like it sat out in the garage for 20 years, and needs repair (or is just really filthy and needs cleaning), which I do myself. I have a pretty decent tool kit at this point, and it's something I enjoy doing. And if I mess something up, oh well--at least it wasn't someone elses gear LOL. The value I give to my buyers is they know exactly what they're getting, have really good pictures of the stuff, and I do a professional job packing and shipping. I take the risk of buying the stuff in unknown condition, and sometimes I have to eat it--but because I take that risk away from my customers I'm able to get upper end of the market when I sell it. KEH has a similar value to a customer, only more so--they're a big outfit that's been around forever, and they have a guarantee. I've only sold a couple of things to them (Olympus OM-2s), but I was happy with what I got. I did the math, and factoring in my time, the fees that ebay and paypal take (about 10% for a BIN auction), I did pretty good. That won't always be the case of course (as the OP found), and that's why I still sell on ebay. As an interesting side note, more than half my customers end up being overseas--a LOT of stuff goes to Indonesia, Thailand, Hong Kong and that area of the world. Last year it seemed like more went to Europe. Global economics or something.

[jose angel]

In my bussiness, it doesn`t matter what you have payed for your item. What matters is my cost price, that could be much lower than the ammount the costumer pay for it.

And I bet they are not willing to pay you more than their cost price (and for a secondhand item), nor a little less... but a noticeable lower ammount. It doesn`t make sense to do it otherwise. Many products are highly charged or overpriced, it could be one of them.
It could also happen that they are not interested in your item (e.g. hard to sell, too much stock) so they offer a ridiculous ammount to "save" that risk.

[Jeff Keller]

Just as a reference point ... I picked up a GT5561SGT with a center column, an Arca Swiss Z1, and a very nice zippered nylon reinforced bag for very close to $1000 on ebay recently. I even had a reason to use it today :-)
Jeff