eBay Chat with Dena in Illinois, "The Buck Stops Here Lady," and Suzanne's Rants 💵 😂

How Hello Hello listeners. Welcome back to another episode of eBay the right way. This is episode number 76. And today's date is August 31st 2022. Wow, another month of 2022 is over. I want to do some shout outs to sellers who purchased my bolo book and their comments. I am just blown away by the responses and I'm so happy. Some of you have already found items in the book. Remember, seek. Cynthia left this comment. Just as I expected, you knocked it out of the park with the 2022 bolo

I Suzanne how are you?

I'm doing great. We start off with asking where you are located.

I am located in Huntley, Illinois, which is a suburb of Chicago, 45 minutes Northwest, so a little town about 30,000 people. I've been down here in this area since 99. And I love it.

I'm sensing maybe you're originally from New York.

No, no, that's not the accent. I was born and raised in Schaumburg, Illinois, which is a big suburb of, of Chicago. My I have a weird voice because I got strep throat. I hit it like four times in a row. So you save a really high pitched voice. But my freshman year in high school, my vocal cords get all screwed up.

So well, it's more the accent. So I guess it's Chicago.

It's Chicago acts. Okay. So yeah,

I am down here in the south. I, I hear a lot of accents. We have a lot of transplants that come down here to Atlanta. And so it's just a game I play and like, the guests were there from game. So I was wrong. Okay, with like that. Okay, good. So you probably have access to a lot of good stuff for stores, estate sales, garage sales.

We we do out here, there's always somewhere to go or something to do or a state sale happening or, you know, a garage sale. It's just, you know, are they good? Are they not good? You could spend your whole time sourcing because there's just unlimited, and it's easy to get to Milwaukee or Wisconsin or Indiana? Really? It's a lot to choose from.

Good for you. So you're you're in a thrifting Mecca. Yes, yes. Are you? Okay, so I asked you to come on the podcast because I kept seeing your sales and saying your name wrong on the videos. So it's Napoli not enough. Holy. So I apologize for that. Thank you for setting me straight. He's a Rene brown wrong all the time. And I, I don't really worry about it. But yeah, I

don't really worry about it. Just don't call me late for dinner, you know, call me.

Okay, so let's talk about how you got started. So okay.

So I started in February of 2020. And how we got into it is that my mom passed away in 2018. And she was a she had cancer short, bounce fast, fast. And she was an antique dealer. She would buy states, when they would go to the time that you didn't buy him online. You'd go and raise the little, the little number and yeah, all Yeah, right, right. You'd go to the courthouse, so she would buy estates, and then they would clean them out and sell all the contents. And then she was also

So just put it aside and then like

that, and my sister's like we're on the second dumpster like, no, no, oh, no, no, no. So anyway,

my heart

hurt my heart as well. After I started then I went home, and I'm a researcher. So I'm like online going, oh my god mom is this mum is this mum is this level of law? So I took over the packing up everything my sister took over, getting the townhouse sold and all the other paperwork. And I think on my ex husband works for a storage container facility. He's one of the national managers. So I'm like, I need like five pack rats, please, please, please,

Yeah, the glass market has really fallen in the past few years.

Yeah. But you know, it will recycle back around.

Yeah, it's just like stock market, it just kind of goes up and down and things will come back.

So we just put those away. And in February and like I told about my son, I'm like, Hey, I'm going to sell some of the stuff on eBay. Do you know anything about eBay? And my son's like, oh, yeah, I've been selling sports cards on there for the last six months. Man. Did you notice I didn't ask you for any money for, you know, week for like lunch or anything at college and like, oh, no, I didn't know this. But thank you for doing that. And he showed me

Yeah, start off with low dollar items that don't matter if you make a mistake and that you're not as apprehensive. This is one thing I tell all beginners in in my beginner videos and stuff. It's like don't start off with the iPhone. Don't start off with a Coach purse. Start off with little kitchen utensils. Just little knick knack II things. Because you know if you don't if you don't have any feedback, did you start off with zero feedback?

Yeah, um, no, I did not because I hijacked my husband's because I couldn't figure out how to set a new one up, right? Because I wanted to use at that at that particular time. I'm like, well, I should have a business so I can't did Graham dogs antiques. So my kids used to call my mom grandma dog. Okay, that a grandma. So we kind

better than that. Probably the date he opened it was yours. 1009. Okay, so I know a lot of beginners listen to this podcast. So sorry seasoned sellers if you know this already, but it's great information to tell people who asked you about getting started when you have zero feedback and your account is just open and then you start listing, high dollar stuff, you are a prime target for all kinds of scams. So if you can, you know you want to establish your account buying

I did when I had all the ducks in the row, then, you know, I didn't want to, you know, go too fast. So that's

my speech. Bad. It's

true. That is true. I've, uh, I haven't been, I've been fortunate enough to have too many scammers. And I've just blocked them right away. But right. You read some horror stories. And I feel bad for some of those sellers who's trying to have fun and make some money. And they got to deal with that stuff. So

well in in it's really just ignorance. And I'm not using that as a in a bad way, like in an insulting way. But if you don't know, you've never done this before. You don't know what all the pitfalls are and what can happen. So that's usually the problem is people just don't know the system. So they get caught up in things that are kind of hard to unravel sometimes.

Right? Yeah, exactly. So

back to your mom's stuff.

So So anyway, so we started, I listed some other stuff, I listed a glass set and all that kind of stuff and made some sales and I was excited. And then all sudden, the pandemic happened, right. And we have another business, which we have a family run business, we make custom apparel and promotional items. And next month, we'll be celebrating 20 years, which

is great. I'm gradually work with my

dad and my brother and my husband. And I had a lot of friends working for me and it was great. But then when the pandemic hit, nothing, everything died. And it looks it was sad. We had no orders, no schools wanted t shirts, and no corporations, they canceled all their, you know, upcoming marketing projects or any they're not having any, you know, seminars or conventions anymore. And I'm like, Oh my God,

I know it was just everybody was walking around like a zombie. Like I don't know what to do. And that was that was really the problem. You know, a lot of people got mad had to wear a mask, you know, this place is closed can't do this, but nobody knew what to do. You know, hindsight is 2020 When you're in the middle of it, it was just so frustrating and watching people's lose their businesses because they couldn't be open or there was no interest. People were hanging on

Know what? Well, I'm in where you're at. It was a little more, I don't want to see light lighter. But up here in Chicago, it was up. Listen, if you walked out of you're afraid to walk out of your house. Yeah, we

could get away with more down here what you're saying the wrong word. Correct. And, you know, you'd see people that just refused wear a mask, and nobody would say anything to him. You know, it was in different parts of the country. It was different situations. You know, when the South was a little more relaxed on some of that stuff. Right?

My son goes to Ole Miss or he goes to University of Mississippi. Yeah, so he was he was okay. And then also, he got sent home. And his girlfriend got sent home from college. And they came back home and then my youngest at the time was still in high school. So he was a stop school for a while. So he had nothing to do and then my stepsister daughter came to live

did you have them pitch tents in the backyard? Y'all staying out there?

I wish I could have I mean, everyone was on top of and everyone was together. So me and my husband would go to work even though there wasn't any work because we didn't want to

omit them. Your escape. Escape so

it worked out for a couple of weeks, and then all sudden they showed up at work and like you guys are watching TV. I'm like, yeah, yeah. Yeah, when we're hungry, I'm like, they found us. They found us, grant. So then it became the fun hobby of selling some of my mom's stuff. And then some of the stuff I thrifted on eBay came to a necessity is that I need to sell stuff to support my family because you still have to pay your mortgage, you still

Well, I love to hear that you came to eBay in 2020. And I've mentioned this before, but my business was great, you know, selling used clothing and swimwear and things that people were using during the times have COVID And you know, people trying to get outside and do more activities and, you know, needed stuff for that. But so many customers were just new on eBay in 2020. Like they decided stores are closed.

I always want to want to ask them, What are you doing with that?

Yeah, you can i i

am sometimes I get a lot of feedback of like, you know, my mom had a lot of deer glasses. I think federal glass. They were like Gazelle glasses. And, you know, I sold a bunch of sets in COVID. And people are like, well, we got nothing else to do. We're just gonna cocktail and fancy 19

Yeah, you know, kitchen stuff. Everybody's cooking at home, outdoor activities, homeschooling stuff, things to entertain kids. Consumable stuff, like, you know, arts and crafts, supplies, things like that. And it was, it was a very interesting, frustrating but interesting time, you had the right things that people wanted.

Right? And by us, all the stores were closed. So right, I first started buying sourcing stuff that goodwill online wasn't very popular. So I was just hauling in tons of stuff. Cheap. Right? in it. Plus, it gave me bubble wrapping boxes that I needed. So desperately stuff. But now everyone knows about Goodwill online. And those prices are just at, you know, at the peak, and it's hard to get a deal on there to pick up something to resell.

Well, but I think as far as that situation and prices in the stores have gone up. I think if you look at the laws of economics, you can only push those prices so high. And people are just like, No, I'm not doing that. And, you know, they have to find that sweet spot of where people are going to buy because Goodwill has no shortage of stuff. And they're just going to keep getting more, you know, people like you that need five storage units for a loved one. Right and whatever.

I can't even

I started shopping at Walmart for groceries, which I don't normally do because it's just not convenient. Like it's a little bit out of the way. But you know, there's Walmarts everywhere but, you know, some of their items are two to $4 cheaper. It's the same exact thing and it's like, I'm sorry, Publix and Kroger. This is where I draw the line. I'm not paying $4 For that when Walmart has it for two and you know, you do that on 100 items. That's a lot of money.

Yeah, I know. I was still I was at Walmart some of the prices they had strawberries for. I wanted to describe. It was like 450 a four pack. What is it a pound?

A little a little pint? Yeah.

No frickin way I'm not doing that. Yeah, it was ridiculous. I just that's a different topic for a whole different I

know we could we could have a grocery price. commiserating podcast where I just thought You belong. And we all talk about that. But I'm just saying that that's a great example of consumers, just putting their foot down and drawing the line and like, No, I'm not doing I'm not paying $8 for a bathing suit, I'm going to resell, no, I'll go on senior day and get a lower price or wait till it's half price or go to a different thrift store. But, you know, I have these conversations in my head the

I do the same thing. Like, oh, no, no, no, no.

Not that nice, right? Unless I could sell them for 100, then maybe, but

it's different. That's different. But then you have to know your product that you're selling. Right. So you might find something at the Goodwill for $12 and sell for 100. Okay, that's a good flip, but it's not a good flip. If it sells for 15. You lost one

Ernie even Yeah. 30 work involved. So anyway, I seem to have a lot of rants going on in this podcast. So the grocery rant is over and we're going to talking about Goodwill online that you were doing it but then that kind of fizzled out,

right that got to a little cutthroat, so they got out the Goodwill's and stuff opened up. For me to get out there, I remember the first day they opened people were in lines out here. Everyone was so excited. So we hit for one day, and that was fun. So we just trucked along. In that time two, my husband had quadruple bypass heart surgery. So

yeah, I hope you had good insurance.

We did. We did. So we had that in COVID, too. And yeah, it's just been like, it was just one punch after another. But things started picking up with her other work. And in, you know, the eBay was was was good to steal. So I just kept doing both. And, you know, sometimes I pick up some of my mom's stuff and sell. I just have a hard time doing it. Because I have an emotional connection to it. Yes. So I kind of put it back on my sister, my brother like, you guys got it. You gotta sell some a lot of

It's just you and shake it up. And you're like, Oh, I remember this. And we use this at Thanksgiving. And it just Yeah, then all of a sudden, you're just this quivering heap on the floor crying because it's like, and then you'd have to stop for the day and do something else and then come back again. Or put that item aside. I've helped several people do this with their parents, or spouse, and it's just, you don't realize how it's going to affect you emotionally. And how that changes your whole

Right? Yeah. So it's, it's, it's, it's still hard. I'm actually my, my, in the eBay business and the reselling business, it's kind of still a family affair. So everything we always do is just family, right? So, you know, my dad was at a antique mall, and he goes, Oh, you need to go to this antique mall. This was last November, I rented your booth. Okay, so I go in there, and they actually ended up being great people that that's a family run antique cute

Go shopping Oh no, no, oh, you take too long. I'm gonna run some errands and come back what?

My my son's girlfriend loves to go. Thrifty with me. And so but the whole cart, I say, go pick out whatever you want. It's all for her. It's I can't sell any. That's because it's for me. I'm like, okay. But anyways, so what's nice is that when I go there, I talk to interact with people. I get to see, you know, sometimes I stay for an hour or two and just walk around and talk to customers see what they're looking for. Because I want to gauge what's

Right? I know that that perfectionism gets in the way sometimes. And it's just the way you're wired something wrong with it. But hey, no, this might only be on eBay for 30 minutes, you know, somebody might be looking for this. And all this extra work and fine tuning wasn't really needed.

Well, when I first started doing eBay, I'm up. I graduated with a history major. So I always want to know, what things were they were made, how they were made, who made it, the story behind it, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,

Oh, I love that. So that's why I love

it. So I have my mom had, like I said she loved depression glasses, she had all of the Depression, glass books and stuff. So I really love reading books and looking through the books then flipping online looking for something. And so I have a bunch of antique books now. And so I'll do a lot of research and stuff like that. And I was putting a lot of that stuff in my listings. But I'm thinking I'm the only one that

But what I'm hearing is that you do have a not a lot of knowledge and you like doing it. So you could eventually monetize something, you know, or just do it for fun. And put it out there and you'll be helping people because that's what the part I love is researching, like, what is this brand? And where did it come from? And I've never heard of this before, and it's 15 years old, you know?

Right? That's a great idea. That is that is a great idea I would love. There's so many possibilities of what you could do in this whole reselling community in business that we're in is that, you know, you can do whatever you want, sky's the limit, whatever you enjoy, whatever you want to express and share with other people, there's now avenues and outlets to get that out there.

And the technology is there so much better. It just gets better all the time, things are faster. Used to be you know, writing a blog was just such a project, you know, you get it to get it put together. And now there's just all these things are cookie cutter, and you can just jump on there and do it. So just just throw in that little,

I would love to be great. Now my sister is such a great writer. So I'm waiting for her to retire. So she could come work for me and write the blocks. I can what I want to say and then she can write.

Yeah, that's perfect. That's perfect. So one day that knowledge will manifest in another way. And you'll probably love doing it.

I always wanted to work in a museum that was I was going to school to be a lawyer. And then I wanted to work in a museum. I wanted to do work with Chicago history. I always thought that the city of Chicago had some rich and thick and interesting history. And then I ended up working at a pizza place and being a manager and then working for my family company and then starting another family company and then starting this family company. So maybe one day I'll do something that I wanted to do.

Yeah, that's a good project for later on down the road when it's not so physical and you can just write I hope so that's

what I'm trying to do right now. Now that I'm transitioning to that, you know, the next half of my life is that I'm trying to figure out okay, what can I do? To be in the next half of my life, that's, I will enjoy that, that will bring in some income won't kill me, you know, literally. And I won't get emails at two o'clock in the morning of people saying, where's my T shirt? Or is my spirit we're going to be ready? Or are those heads going to be

right? Yeah. And you can always set up a consulting site, where you talk to people who want help with their item, like, there's appraisal sites where you, you pay 20 bucks, and there's, or there's, you know, you could be the depression glass expert, or whatever you want. Whatever you want to title yourself, but

he loves depression glass, but I like mid century matter.

Okay, well, just the wheels are turning right. I love it. I love it a lot you can do on the side. Because sometimes people do want a person who's knowledgeable and they just want to talk to you on the phone for 30 minutes, you, you could set up something like that for a fee. And I've done all these things in the past. And I just got to where talking on the phone was too draining, as I was doing it all day, every day, and you're just saying one

It can it can it can it get to the point that you know, you feel like you need to list you know, everyone says list five items a day, are you gonna list tonight and it was the day? Will you do that for month, you don't want to list 10 items a day or five hours a day. Sometimes you don't want to list at all you don't want to look at that death pile, you don't want to you don't want to go to a goodwill, you don't want to go shopping, you don't want to do it. And you shouldn't have to.

Yeah, yeah, and you're right, five items a day, 10 items a day, it's, it gets to be like working for the man, you know, doing the same thing over and over and over and you're your own boss. And like, one time I had maybe 20 pairs of shoes, and I'm listing these shoes, and I'm like, I can't look at these shoes to Goodwill for two hours and just get out of here. Right yet some other things. I mean, I have some pretty strict rules for myself.

I gotta get free. I gotta get free. And, you know, we read online sometimes to people I listed 30 items today. What kind of, did you listen to good items? Did you even put like the condition it was in? Did you even write a complete sentence that didn't have spelling errors when you listed it because you're only thinking about listing quantity items instead of quality of items, or things that will sell and make you money?

Yeah, I know. Sellers feel bad when they see these pictures of you know piles of packages that are being mailed that day or 50 items today. Well, first of all, anything can be photoshopped found on the internet, you don't know if that's real. But and then, are those 50 items? Did you add items that were already listed and just restart them? Is that your definition of listing? Did you take all the pictures on that day? Because sometimes I'll take a whole bunch of pictures.

amazing sales. And I'm

willing to bet a lot of these were your mom's items now that I know the story. Oh, whoa, oh, then Gosh, I'm just wrong all over the place on this past. But her experience in antiques, we're all right, definitely filtered down to you because you for

I do, I do. Uh, you know, it amazes me that every, every month, I know a little bit, something more. I know a lot more than I knew last year. It try to filter that down at my kids a little bit to research what they're doing. I have been known to left a antique book in the bathrooms for the kids who read, you know, when they're gonna be in there for a long while I study or maybe something will spark your interest here. But they're very smart. And they

That's interesting. And, you know, reselling, whether it's eBay or antique booth, or, I mean, that's been happening for 1000s of years. I mean, come on. But that's a skill that they'll have forever.

Well, and they sell so they spell sell sports cards online. They go to sport conventions, card conventions, they're always running around getting the cards, they listen to a lot of YouTube, watch a lot of YouTube of the breaks, they call them now have them open up the cards. And you know, sports card collecting is a lot different than when we are kids because we would go to the drugstore and buy a pack of

Excellent. So let's hear about some of those sales. So were you on the spot Yeah.

What do you want to talk about?

Which ones well just some memorable sales maybe net were high dollar or surprise do you or are they sold very quickly.

I could do that. Okay, so I was looking through some of my eBays sales and I first started off with a couple jewelry pieces of my mom's because I was I just so pretty. They don't make jewelry like they did in the 30s 40s 50s and 60s. So I did the first big sale I had was a piece of Trafigura jewelry. It was a swallow jello, Jelly Belly brooch. And I sold that for I think $150 And so

how and jewelry is very tedious to read. Because, Oh, so you've got to have your loop or whatever you're used. I

bought a loop, I bought a nice microscope, we thing and COVID Look it all up because my eyes are going and the older need the nicer stuff to see the little like, you know, pressing granite, you see the maker's mark of it. So

yeah, and it's a lot of it looks the same. So when you use Google lens, you get irrelevant results. Because a lot of it looks the same. And there's only so many things you can do with a brooch. Right, right. I found that too. I tried some jewelry lots, and I just didn't enjoy it. I mean, I know it's highly profitable. But it just seemed very tedious to me. Looking it all up, and I wasn't confident because that's just not a category I know very well.

Right? Right. So that scares me a little bit. So I switched to I really like glassware. I like Mid Century Modern glassware. I like since I'm in marketing and advertising. I love marketing and advertising glasses. I love the 80s especially at old smart glasses or the 70 Pepsi Cola glasses. I love old ink or hacking glasses, maybe glasses, all the fun patterns. Those. Again, I bought some books, I did some research. And I always find those are really easy to sell for me and I enjoy listing

you feel like the biggest loser in the world? Because you have all this great stuff. You know it's priced. Right? Right? And you're just not getting anything and it's just very frustrating. And

you know, you walk around and you got your head down and you're moping you know, and then I try to pick myself up and I think Okay, I gotta what have I learned from like listening to your podcasts and listening to some other people? What's selling now so like, you know, I picked up I picked up some bedsheets because I thought you had someone that sold bed sheets. Or you said that the old linens it was probably a few different people that yeah, parasol they were new and

Oh, I see everyone was cleaning because they ride boobs and they were probably out of stock online and all the stores were closed so we're gonna get them right. And you've got you know 10 packs of the Hoover XYZ sides that everybody needs and yeah, it's just it was

it was a good sell. It was a good sale so I that was fun. Another mains lead what else did I sell? Oh, I just sold I posted on Monday was that you had the the lady that sold all the Alexa electronics and like Home good stuff like blenders and in coffee, like, clear coffee. Remember that woman?

I think was it Olivia pool? I mean, podcasts. Yes. I think it was Olivia, the coffee pot lady.

Well, I found a Vitamix blender just

saw that, you know, I just bought a Vitamix a few weeks ago, that was my birthday present to myself because wanting our Oh, stir exploded all over my kitchen. And I was like, Nope, I'm getting a good one this time. And might as

well with stuff like that. Yeah, but you don't even have to go pay for place. You can always find it online.

Yeah, yeah. And it was just, I saw you posted the blender, the piece called the container part. Did you get for that? Or do you find that worse? You? Yeah. Yeah.

So it did. I was a little upset because it did go to a man that once he bought it, I checked his eBay out because I'm a little Snoopy. And I wanted to see what if he sold stuff? Yeah, he sells research.

It's not called stalking. It's research,

research research. I'm trying to find out who my client is. Right. But, uh, yeah, so and he kept hounding me that, can you ship this just the cheapest way? You're shipping too much. It's 16 Whatever. It was like, no, no. And I finally told him, I said, Well, you said you're charging $94 to ship yours. I think you could afford my

own. I mean, it has to have enough packing to make sure it's not gonna break.

Oh, yeah. And plastic, it can break it can

but shipping is it can break if it gets underneath 400 pounds of mail and one of those cars, anything can crush,

right. And that's my, my, my, that's my biggest fear is for anything to break. I am the bubble wrap queen. I think my highest rating on my feedback is because of backing fast insecurely. I had in the beginning, when I sold I sold some a plate set. And it was heavy. And I thought I packed it well. And I shifted all the way to California, in in transit, the lady wanted to cancel the order. Because if her husband finds out that she bought this, she's going to be in big

Right. Yeah. So just a note on returns. You might not know this, but having returns places you higher in search.

I know but I'm just I'm afraid I you know what probably I read too much on the internet. And I see all these people returning stuff in there, which a lot of these people are making the stuff up. I mean, somebody was saying I you know, I'm that they're returning? Well, they got

just let me give you my spiel on that. Everybody accepts returns with eBay's guarantee. So you might be forced into doing it. If you put it on your listings. And I challenge you to try this. And just try it for a couple of weeks and see how you feel. You do get higher placement and search eBay has told us that it immediately creates customer confidence when they see no

now, Suzanne, do you wrap up? I know that if I do everything, except for that to be a top, they have that little badge, that fun little top rated seller. Yeah. Right. So do you have that?

Um, I think so. I know, I move in and out of it. Okay. Um, some sometimes, yes. Sometimes it just depends on what's happening in my store. And do I need the benchmarks for that? It really doesn't matter if you have that or not, if you have that somebody wants, you know, yeah, I

always you always see that. And they're like, do you just recipt returns? Here, we'll give you this fun little badge. Well,

that's, you can see what happens. You might get it if you accept returns, but I 100% understand where you're coming from. It's what what's going to happen to me, what are people going to do to me? And you know, you're gonna there's just crazy people out there that shop on eBay, I had, I had some return one day. Well, it was the last week it was a bra that had the little hook and I closures.

so. So can you if they want to return it can't they'll they'll pay for the shipping? Well,

it depends on the reason they pick, they pick item not as described, then you have then you're charged that the seller is charged. But what eBay has done is they have when someone wants to return something, there's a list of reasons and it can be didn't fit, didn't like the color, blah, blah, blah, all these reasons that are, you know, pretty generic reasons. And then at the bottom of the list is

Well, you do a lot of more apparel, which which give you half and half now, is it happening.

I'm transitioning to more collectibles and plush and things that don't get returned. I really watch that, because some things just got returned all the time. So I quit selling those brands or like anthropology, I don't sell that anymore. Because people they were buying the item and then sending me back their old crappy one acting like that's what I sent them doing the switcheroo. And I'm like, I'm not playing

see it is a challenge accepted.

And if you have any questions, you know, feel free to email me out. But I guess I've returned Suzanne. We'll see what we'll get. What are they read, for clients that I've worked with other sellers that have a lot of returns, it's usually something they're doing wrong on the front end. They're not getting enough information.

on. Separate, you know, it's fine. It's fine, fun, fun. Let's do fun stuff. What else? What else?

Um, so how many items do you have listed at this time?

So right now, I think I had like, 245 258 around there. Since I still have the day job gig. I'm trying to transition. I don't want to say I call it semi retired. I'm trying to weed out the customers that in that part of the business that sucks up the most amount of my time for the least amount of money. And I'm trying to retire from them. And then keep the clients that really do give me a bang for my buck. And instance, I work with my brother and my dad on that

I mean, your name is Napoli

but I'm okay with it. It's sunsets, everyone always thinks, Well, I got like 1900 listings? Well, do you have 90 listings? Because you list a lot and your full time? Or do you have 90 100 items because you're not putting out stuff that people want to buy?

Right? It's just accumulating.

Right? Not everything sells not everything is valuable. Every you know, just because you bought it you put it out there doesn't mean that someone wants it.

Yeah, and sometimes that's someone it takes them two years takes them

two years, I just sold something I had listed for two years it was seen that I had listed and it was nothing that was like for $10. But someone bought it two years later, I don't even think I had it promoted or nothing. I kind of just gave up on it and said I don't feel like walking over and taking it out of my storage plan. So I just leave it right there and someone buys it they buys it. And it took two years and they love it. You never

know the reason someone is going to need it. I had this happen the other day I sold nice Athleta dress $59 tag on it. Had it for probably a year and a half. Finally got an offer $30 I'm like okay, I'm taking it and the girl sends a message she's like, thank you so much for accepting my offer my puppy just shoot up my dress exactly like this and I'm replacing it. And I'm thinking yay for you getting a puppy and

a big kiss for me.

I wrote her back and said, Oh, I'm so sorry that happened, you know, shipping it out today. And she said, Well, he's eaten. A pair of shoes, my peloton, t shirt, and our patio furniture. So it's like, okay, so am I waiting for someone to get a puppy who's going to chew up their shoes that I have the exact pair?

Always got that

you never know. I mean, happened. So never know.

So yeah, so that I'm comfortable with about 250 listings. For the holidays, I would like to amp that up a little bit too. But maybe like 303 25. I always think that fourth quarters really big time for our industry. So I like to get us some little more stuff up there for that. Other than that, I started listing some Christmas Halloween, I started stacking up my antique booth for Christmas and Halloween. So I'm kind of just throwing all my, you know, all my eggs in the fourth

it'll be interesting to see what happens this year, because the stores still aren't very well stocked nothing. And things run out online. Right now Amazon have out of stocks. And I think that's an opportunity for eBay sellers that were sitting on all this inventory. It's it's right here, we don't have any supply chain or delivery issues, you know, we just print that label

Oh, I know, I know, it's a lot of furniture. So I'm in the process of taking the the warehouse space that we have for other businesses about 3500 square feet. So I'm taking half of that space, and I'm going to kind of put some of the furniture in there. And then I'm always thinking business wise. So as I coincide that I'll roll out a website with the pictures of those. So someone sees that they could come pick it up, or you know, we could talk about delivery. So I love how that can

I mean, it's just a process. You know, it is it is

and it's not, it's not. The process for me is not done right now in there, right now. So a lot of the listings that you're seeing that I'm selling now are from my college roommates, parents estate. So my dear friend Kevin, and we live together one year at Loyola University Downtown in Chicago. And he was a mama's boy and used to call his mom every night at 1030. And we used to kid are you talking to your mom, and, you

So in addition to wonderful chicken and dumplings and country fried steak, Cracker Barrel, and stuff pack might sell for good money if it's older. Yeah.

Which he has tons of so I'm waiting to diamond, I can't wait to dive into that research and figure out what the values are those so I've been helping and so I'm trying to pass on my knowledge to other people to about that. So, yeah, so like, the sacral t shirt that I sold for. I forgot how much I sold it for, like six $50 I'm like this will never sell. He's like, everyone loves soccer. No, we both played soccer back in the day. And he's a company that like soccer anymore, like that's

yeah, an hour. Yes. So you sound like the buck stops here, lady. All these things kind of filter down to you. And you may have them in a storage unit. But your, your intention is to deal with them to rehome them. So it doesn't just get passed on again,

you know, I feel like I feel like there is a place where everything and there's a place for me. I am very good at selling I am very good at researching I'm very good at at I'm very caring. So this works for me. My sister's a little more businesslike. And so as my dad is the typical 19 ad salesperson that use telephone call, so he gets results we get but we all do it a different way. But I want to make sure that I save as much as we can. Because once the stuff is gone,

luckily for us, there are some people that will never set foot in a goodwill, they will never buy anything used. And I do forget and all their stuff is it's all ended up in the goodwill when they downsize and you know, thin out their possessions. They take it to Goodwill, but they're never going to shop in there so

well. And that's the whole thing is that I always think that people want to save things, and they love the history of things. But I gotta remember, there's not a lot of people like me, there's not a lot of people like you. And you know, a lot of people just throw it out and throw it out and throw it out. So how do we say that, you know, their garbage is mind game.

We need them to be our suppliers know

about don't put down that book don't read about the history of that

though, when I go to when I do go to Target or TJ Maxx or you know those kinds of stores and I see all these people just with their carts mounded up with stuff I'm like, Oh, goody, that's gonna be in the goodwill, six months a year from now. They redecorate all the time, and they just buy all new stuff and do what I do with old stuff. They may donate it now it may sit there until forever when it has to be donated. But those are our suppliers.

I love our supplier.

I know. Okay, well we are getting here. So last question is since you are a newer seller, and have done very well what kind of advice would you give to others thinking about starting or that are new to eBay.

My dad had the same in in, in in I always was thinking about it and always like I tell anyone this. And it's always be kind to the people that you see up the way up on the ladder of life because it's the same people that you'll see on the way down. So if you did a great job selling something on eBay, someone will save you as a seller and they'll you know get alerts when you list stuff. So be nice to people say thank you. When someone places an order and pays for it. shoot them an email

That's great advice. You get back what you put out there.

That's right. Okay, well

thank you for taking time out of your busy day to chat and we will look for your amazing sales. On a Facebook group.

Thanks Suzanne. Appreciate it.

Okay by right thank you Dana for making time to come on my podcast. I appreciate what you have contributed and I know the listeners will appreciate it to today's trivia question is another food one. What is the meaning of the brand name of ice cream? Haagen DAAS. What do those words mean? Here are five seconds to think about it. Okay, here is the backstory. 1960 Rubin and Rose mattes had a vision for changing the world of ice cream at a time when others were cutting corners and pumping