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EBay - Anyone Else Notice This?

Illbay

Illbay

Jan 15, 2008
1,681
33
Houston, Texas
www.whitherthefool.org
#1
Just a couple of years ago, I found I could fish around on eBay for just about anything in the way of a used bass on auction. It was great.

Now, it seems like for electric basses at least, there are seldom any auctions. Everything is "Buy It Now!" from a dealer. It stinks, because of course the dealer's got his markup in there. You're going to typically pay, in my estimation, about a hundred bucks more for a used instrument from a dealer than you would from an individual, S&H not included.

I'm not sure why this is, although I recall when I was selling instruments through eBay a few years ago I came to the realization that their fees made it almost impossible to do more than break even. It may be that eBay has sort of priced themselves out of the "for sale by owner" market.

And maybe that was the plan all along.
 
#4
Ebays changed a lot of things to make sure they get all the money out of auctions that they can. And more and more stores and such were trolling auctions looking to snatch up low cost instruments they could resell.

One of the more irritating changes 'for me' was one where if you put a Buy It Now on an auction and someone makes any bid it kills the Buy It Now and the auction becomes a normal auction. So to avoid that you have to put a minimum bid high enough that you can live with it, or pay more money to put a Reserve Price on it. If you're doing that you might as well just put it up with only the Buy It Now price. First day of an auction people would go around putting 99cent bids on $1000 basses and kill off the Buy It Now. Irritating and frustrating... and ebay doesn't care in the least.
 
#5
elgecko said:
The number of commercial sellers has definitely increased dramatically. However, the mom and pop sellers are still there if you look and that's usually where the best deals are.
Click to expand...

I'm not saying there are "no auctions," but I'll give you an example.

I just did a search for Brubaker Basses, and found ten on sale with "But It Now," apparently all from "stores." There were ZERO auctions.

I looked for F-Bass. THREE Auctions, each with high initial bids and a "Buy It Now" alternate (though apparently from individuals). And about TEN "Buy It Now" sales, all through "stores."

Just some anecdotal evidence.
 
#7
High initial bids and slightly higher Buy It Now is to get around people putting stupid low initial bids and killing the Buy It Now as I described. The Initial bid is essentially what the person feels they need to have for the instrument.

Higher initial bid means more auction money for ebay. Buy It Now means more money for ebay. Reserve Price means more money for ebay.
 
#11
It is current ebay policy to increase profits and more importantly push up share prices by discouraging small auctions by individuals and to encourage more BIN and fixed price auctions by commercial sellers. The idea is to get a larger market share of internet purchases in general and to establish themselves as a first point of contact for internet shoppers.

Changing the feedback system to be more 'friendly' to sellers was part of this strategy.

This is from the horse's mouth, as I read about the policy in an interview in the Sunday Times business pages with a European ebay higher-up of some sort.
 
#12
EagleMoon said:
Ebay's policies have scared people away. From enforcing PayPal only to their not releasing money until the buyer gives you positive feedback (or for a number of days) for example.
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I waited 21 days to get paid. That was the first time I had ever had to wait for my payment. It is also bad if you need to sell fast and buy right away. :spit:
 
#14
Ya, the 21 day thing is an irritation. There are some things that will trigger that though.

I've got over 80 positive feedback and have never had the 21 day wait for payment... then I changed my passwords on ebay and paypal and started a couple auctions and POW, instant 21 day wait. I'm sure the system assumed my account had been stolen and the passwords changed and bogus autions put up. I also know that they consider some things "high risk" like computers, cell phones, etc... but I'd never had any problems with getting 21 days wait on simple guitar pedals.
 
#15
You guys seem to know this E-bay thing...... I bought a Learn and Master Guitar course, turned out to be all bootleg DVDs. Did the Paypal Resolution thing...They told me refund was awarded to me and pending......5 days later Paypal informs me they are having trouble pulling the bucks out of the seller's bank. If this crook disappears will Paypal follow through with the refund? Being a sceptic, I gotta believe there is a tiny clause in Paypal's terms......Bud
 
#17
One Drop said:
Changing the feedback system to be more 'friendly' to sellers was part of this strategy.
Click to expand...


Totally opposite ... I sell a good bit on Ebay and two years ago actually owned one of those brick and mortar drop off your stuff and we will sell it on Ebay stores.

Ebay is very hostile towards sellers and have lost a good number of them. A seller cannot give negative feedback no matter what a buyer does including extortion ... example the one neg I have is from a buyer who bought a Strat for 99.00 and then went straight to Paypal and put it in dispute, but said if I sent them 40.00 back I wouldn't have a problem ... I did a full refund instead guess what they kept the guitar and the money :eek:... Ebay would not lift a finger to help. :scowl:

Here is the problem with auctions unless you have an item that you know will cause a bidding war then your safer to just BIN. So many BIG dealers in the game that they flood the market MF is just one of the big players.

:smug: ... I sell mostly guitar/bass parts and pickups now and don't even try to compete wit them.
 
#19
groooooove said:
...but it does stink, ebay used to be for regular people to sell stuff they dont want or need..
Click to expand...

I guess that's what I'm talking about. I don't so much mind the proliferation of stores, but there are very few auctions conducted by individuals any more.

I used to be virtually assured of finding at least two or three individuals selling something I wanted. Now, I go there and search, and if there's anything at all, it's a BIN sale by a store, period.

If they're selling new, it's the same price you can buy it from GC or Zzounds, e.g. And if it's used, the mark-up is stupid.

I haven't been in the market for anything of late, so I haven't perused the TB classifieds much, but I'll go there if I want something before I'll hit eBay.
 
#20
Illbay said:
I do think Craigslist and other sources (TB, for bass gear) are partly to blame.

Ironically, the last bass I bought was just a couple of months ago, from an individual on eBay. But the majority of my used bass gear in the last year has come from here.
Click to expand...

I don't like ebay, never have. I am tired of being sniped at the last second and losing auctions...I bought 1 bass and it was a Buy it now, and that was that.

Craigslist stinks too, IMHO. I placed one ad one time and got about 45 responses, 2 were legit in that they were real people, the rest were bots or smarmy people trying to sell me something or scam me....

I do most of my biz here on TB.
 

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