By Bryan Dulaney

When I first started to sell things on eBay, it was a way to get rid of some excess possessions I didn’t really need. My grandparents were both packrats and, when they died, I inherited a lot of their stuff. Quite a bit of it had sentimental value and I decided to keep that stuff. Nonetheless, there was a lot that I simply didn’t need. Some of it was old, quirky, collector stuff. My grandfather had old 45s and 78s, and my grandmother had quite a bit of porcelain. Selling things on eBay seemed like a great way to liquidate that stuff quickly. It certainly beat sitting outside all day with it at a garage sale!

What surprised me was the amount of money I made selling things on eBay. Don’t get me wrong ñ it wasn’t a fortune ñ but it was a lot more than I had expected. A lot of the stuff I was selling was sort of niche goods. At a garage sale, it would have been unlikely for someone to come along who realized the value of a particular record, or of a particular piece of jewelry. On eBay, however, there were collectors of all stripes, all of them willing to search a great deal for just such an item. As a result, they bid up the value of several pieces which I had viewed as insignificant. It really made me think about the financial possibilities.

I decided that the best thing to do would be to start a store to sell things on eBay. There are two kinds of eBay sellers ñ the casual ones and the professional ones. Casual sellers tend to post something every once in a while, whereas professionals own a storefront. A storefront gives you recognizability and makes people associate your products with you. It is pretty easy to set up, and it definitely increases your traffic. Once I gave myself a professional look, I was really raking in business. It was not too long before I was making hundreds of dollars of profit a week. It wasn’t enough to live on, but it was a great supplementary income.

Of course, it wasn’t quite that easy to sell things on eBay. I had to invest in a lot of different trinkets, and it took a while for business to get rolling. Nonetheless, if you have a good eye for collectibles or a ready supply of stuff you want to get rid of, selling on eBay can be a great way to start. 

 

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