eBay the Right Way
Learn how to sell on eBay the right way. Suzanne A. Wells has been selling on eBay since 2003 and has been an influencer in the eBay community since 2007. This podcast is designed for the full or part time at-home seller who loves the reselling process including the thrill of the hunt, rehoming used items, and building a home business they love. eBay is a way of life, not just a side hustle. Suzanne has been featured in Money Magazine, Martha Stewart Magazine, Women's World, and All You magazines as an eBay expert. You can find her on YouTube and Facebook as Suzanne A. Wells.
eBay the Right Way
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Happy Selling!
Music, hello, eBay. Ears. Welcome to episode number 206 of eBay the right way. Today's date is February 26 2025 my guest is Heather in New York. Announcements, I finally posted my January sales update on YouTube. So if you haven't checked it out, please do you can see what I sold, hear some customer stories and see what I purchased and listed since the last sales update. Remember, I'm a real seller, just like you out in the eBay trenches. Every day, some days are better than others, but we are all in this together. Okay, now let's meet Heather. Hello, listeners, welcome back. I have Heather with us today. And how are you doing this
Unknown:morning? Emma, thank you. How are you good?
Suzanne Wells:Good and tell us where you're located.
Unknown:So I live on Long Island in New York. I'm in Nassau County, which is like closer to Queens. Okay, a lot of people think of Long Island as like a very, wealthy campdency place, but we're like the suburban 50s idea of what like suburbia was going to be. So we're the transition from the city into, like the nicer neighborhoods. I live in, a great neighborhood. I don't want to say that, but it's not like these sprawling mansions. We're just in regular houses,
Suzanne Wells:right, right? Long Island has different parts. I've never been there, but I've talked with several people that live there and have friends that live there too. So we'll do some name dropping when we're not recording. Okay, anyway. And how long have you been there?
Unknown:Well, I just, we just renovated the house that I grew up in, that my dad grew up in, so that's one of the reasons why I'm on eBay.
Suzanne Wells:Because, okay, it came
Unknown:with so many things in it. Okay,
Suzanne Wells:great. Okay, well, we'll talk about that. So yeah, why don't you just go over what brought you to eBay and when that happened? So,
Unknown:well, I started on Etsy selling vintage when it was like pretty brand new, and they were real picky about what was going to be on there. And so then it started to get kind of flooded by knock offs and weird businesses and stuff like that. So I had moved over to eBay. And then when I got married and I got pregnant, I just stopped collecting things. I'm a collector, like, I love to, I love to buy weird stuff. And so, you know, anything that I think is like, interesting or different or I've never seen before. I have friends who are really into antiques. So we would go antiquing, and we would go to Broomfield, and broom feels like an eight mile long antique show in for it goes three different times in the summertime in Massachusetts, and it's really, really big, and the East Coast is, like very well known for it. And if you go in September, that's when everybody's packing up. So they don't want to pack things up, so they give you things for very little money, and it's great. Okay,
Suzanne Wells:okay, so you've learned how to work that. And you can learn stuff from
Unknown:people too, because I think the dealers are are so kind to if you're like, I don't know what this is, what do you do with this? Then they explain it to you, and I have a good memory for those things, so then when I see them later, I'll know what they are.
Suzanne Wells:Okay, okay, so pre eBay, what kind of things did you collect?
Unknown:Well, so I love walking where it's these like 1960s and 70s egg cups from England, and they have little legs and Mary jeans on them, or little legs and, like, high heels, and they have tea pots and tea cups. They're really known for their egg cups. When Charles and Diana got married, they did, like a genuflecting one, like one down on one knee. And they're made by Carlton where and so I love them. There are not a billion left in the world. So whenever I see them, I would get really excited, and that was like the main thing I was looking for. But then I picked up weird things along the way. So I loved, like, wind up banks, uh huh. Like, where you wind it up and it collects the money in some way. I love California pod. Three and McCoy and a lot of that 50s, 60s, 70s, planters, like the smaller planters, I think they're so pretty, and I think people like they either love them or they don't love them. I like jewelry for when I got married, instead of flowers, we did brooch bouquets. Oh, and I collected all those brooches. It was just me and my sister. So I did like ambers and greens, and hers was like blues and whites, and they came out great. I've
Suzanne Wells:never heard of that brooch bouquets in the craft world.
Unknown:They were so, so so big. I got married in 2011 they were so, so, so big in like, 2009 to, like, probably 2013 I haven't seen any since. I wouldn't be surprised if they came around again. But, like, it was a huge thing. People would pay probably $500 for one. And you know, if you're forcing your brooches and you just make stuff, it's that would be an easy way to make money, but it's really hard to do, because you have to wire it right. And they're very heavy. Yeah, my all we need
Suzanne Wells:is somebody on Tiktok to show one, and then they'll be popular again.
Unknown:Yeah? Well, mine was more like, like a little bouquet, because it was so heavy. When we started doing it, I was like, how am I even gonna hold this? And I love wooden toys, like, any kind of, like, rolling wooden toys, any kind of handmade wooden toys. I'm not religious at all, but I love Noah's arcs. I and I had, what, many of them over the years, and then I sold them. Like, you know, what am I going to do with, like, a giant wooden Noah's Ark, you know? But it's so cool to see. And there's something in me that's like, I have to find somebody for this, you know. And so, like, I'll buy stuff, and I'll enjoy it for a little while, and then I'll sell it. And that's, I think, kind of like how my eBay stuff is and then a couple of years ago, so I had sold things over eBay a little bit at a time, but I really wasn't sometimes I would buy stuff on eBay. My Account was active since, like 20 since, like 2009 but a couple of years ago, my dad passed away, and we bought his house. And so we had his house that we had to renovate, and my house that we were living in, which we had bought from one of my husband's relatives. And we had a lot of stuff, and we had to pay two mortgages on Long Island, which is like $8,000 a month. Ah, yeah, that's hard. So I was like, alright, well, I'm just going to start selling stuff. Like you tell me what stuff you want to keep. To keep and otherwise like and my husband is he doesn't care about anything like he has no sentimental attachment to anything. And so I had my my dad was a real collector to my dad loves. We had a second house up in New Hampshire where he would go anti King, and they would go to auctions and things like that. And he loved all that stuff. And when we sold that house like that, came to this house too. So we had two houses worth of stuff here, and maybe, like, one and a half worth of stuff at my other house. So I was like, alright, well, we're gonna pay some bills. And, like, I feel like, if we have 100,000 things to get rid of every time I sell something, I would just minus it in my head, you know? So, so that's what I started doing. And really, by the it was a really long renovation. So by the end it was, you know, we were getting poor, we were running out of money. And so eBay was really how I bought my groceries because, you know, we'd sell four or five things a week, and that would be 100 bucks, and I could go buy groceries for the week, you know, for the next week. So it, it was like, our real life saver while we were having such a hard time, and I wasn't, I was still sourcing a little bit like, if things, you know, if I thought, Oh, this will go real quick and things like that, but I was really just trying to get rid of what we had and make enough money so that we could not worry about that extra bill,
Suzanne Wells:right? Well, yeah, I've been there. When I first started eBay, I was a single mom and lost my job, and I didn't know sometimes where the next dollar was going to come from, and that's why I did eBay was, you know, I always ended up with enough money
Unknown:at the end of the month, right? You're just
Suzanne Wells:looking at your phone like, Okay, what's the next sale going to be? And Wednesday?
Unknown:Oh, I'll just change this title. Oh, I'll just, I better change that title up. Yeah,
Suzanne Wells:so, and it's, you know, it's whatever eBay means to you. But a lot of people do rely on it for money to make their car payment, or, you know, whatever it is they're doing it for. And sometimes $100 is, is a lot. You know,
Unknown:yeah, and, and we were, like, anything that was really heavy, I would put on Facebook marketplace. And then this summer, we went to, there's a there's a flea market. They call it a flea market. It's really an antique, outdoor antique market that happens every Sunday in Connecticut called the elephant trunk. And it's every Sunday. Maybe it's like from April to October. Sometimes they go into November and December, depending on what the weather is. They kind of take it week by week, and you pay 50 bucks and you set up your area outside. And so I had been sort of putting aside everything that was really heavy, all these planters and stuff like that. I don't want to ship them. I don't want to ship them, so I just haven't been listing them, and I don't necessarily have room for them. I have a 10 year old boy and three dogs, and things break very easily in this house, I bet. So even though I love them, you know, I want them to find a new home. So my sister and I had gone there for a full day, and we sold just as much stuff as furniture, things that were from the old house as well. And so that was nice. And I got to kind of meet some people and see what they were doing. And some of them just save all their smalls for eBay and just bring all their big stuff. And they'll bring their smalls to, you know, to the the outdoor flea market thing. But it's not a flea market, because it is expensive, so I don't want it to sound when it gets cheap, because it's not. It was very expensive. But they have a lot of dealers and stuff like that, but almost all of them are online. They don't have stores anymore, okay, so that was interesting to see, like how they pack it all up, and how they separate everything and because I am disorganized. And
Suzanne Wells:so what was your professional career? Or what did you
Unknown:do? I'm a full time public librarian. Oh, very good,
Suzanne Wells:yeah. So
Unknown:I'm great at research.
Suzanne Wells:So you love all the research and look at things
Unknown:research. I started, actually at our library. We I work at a very small public library, but we have, like, we had a lot of like, McCoy pottery books or Hagar glass or or things like that, you know. And they're not necessarily up to date. They don't publish them anymore, but you can see what's out there, right? Like Blanco glass, there's so much. And if you don't have a book to look at, or like a source to look at, you don't even know. I mean, you know maybe two or three shapes, but you don't know all the other things. Or Pyrex, Pyrex makes some crazy stuff in the in the 60s and the 70s that you just never see again because they were only on bowls and the bulls would break, or whatever. So, so we have, like an anti sem collectible section that has all different kinds of those books that you know now. You can find them at a thrift for like $1 or two because they are like 20 years old, so the pricing is not correct, but you can find out the name of mm hmm, and the history item is Yeah, and the
Suzanne Wells:history is not going to change. And I used to check out couples guides from the library when I first got into eBay, selling more than just my own stuff, just just to learn about what things were. And I really didn't pay any attention to the pricing. I just looked at the pictures and to learn about the names of everything and the history of it and why it's valuable. Because if it was in that book 20 years ago, and it's still valuable now, that's something that you can look for and and sell all the time. Some things that you know, it's just evergreen, they're just not going to change. And some things will come more valuable because they are getting older and they're not being made anymore. So I used to check those out from the library and just put them around my house in different places, the coffee table, the kitchen table, just whenever I had a minute sit down and flip through it. So yeah, there's
Unknown:they still come out every year. They are they COVID Still publishes every year. You can join them online, you can subscribe to them online, stuff like that, but they still publish a real book every year. And so does Overstreet, which does comic books. So like for people into comic books, Overstreet has up to date prices on what you know you would expect. So those are it's like, not. It's a nice place for some people to look because a lot of times, a lot of people come in and say, you know, my my mom just passed away. She collected all of this depression glass. And I'm like it, you know, here's a book on so that you could, you can start listing it, or you could see if you can sell it, and then maybe get an idea of what, what it is. I was like. But, you know, collections of depression glass, it's hard. Now, if it's not pink, you know, green and yellow aren't going, White's not going, but if you can find somebody who's going to buy the whole lot, it's great. But, like, I was like, but I don't really know much about class, so maybe you want to find a glass person. Well, and
Suzanne Wells:you being a librarian, you're a book person. You maybe you like to get your. Information from books. There's just something about that tactile experience of holding a book and turning the pages that's different than looking it up online, right? Well, but I also love
Unknown:looking stuff up online and and I have to say, like, there's been times where, like, what you have found out at through trial and error, is something that I learned about in my master's program, which is keyword searching. So it's we call it the handbag pocketbook problem. So when you can't find what you're looking for and you're searching for handbag, you have to think about other ways that people would call that thing, right? It might be a purse. It might be a pocketbook. So when I teach people how to use databases and how to do searches for themselves, we talk about that a lot about, you know, thinking about things in terms of keywords and how and how another person would look for it, misspelling things and misspelling things all the time. I inherited a lot of vintage Christmas stuff, besides shiny brights, like Polish ornaments, Hambone glass ornaments, a lot of that, like, very kitschy 50s and 60s, because my parents loved Christmas. I don't love Christmas. I have three dogs and a 10 year old. So, like, we don't put a lot of stuff out, and all that stuff will get eaten. I would rather you know it went to somebody. My dogs are my dogs are nuts. They're great, but they're like, there's no we don't have a display house. It's just not a function of our lives. And so for me to know, like my little Noel angels, or the winking Siennas or stuff like that. I mean, they bought those things that were worth, you know, and now they're worth so much money, but I would rather know that it went someplace. And my siblings have already, I was like, What do you want? And they were like, nothing. Our houses are full already, like, I'll take one thing. And I was like, but I have 100,000 things, so they don't care that I'm selling them. They're happy that they didn't go in the garbage. You know, that's what they would have done.
Suzanne Wells:Yeah, that's the problem with generations. Is the older generation, what are you going to do with all their stuff? And most of most people, don't really downsize at the end of life. They just kind of enjoy what's around them. And, you know, let the next generation do it, you know, say, Yeah, I don't care about this. I don't care about that. But they don't want to just have nothing. They want to help their possessions, their nostalgia around them. So there's a downside problem for the
Unknown:well, there's a book called The Swedish art of death, cleaning. Oh, and it's a real tiny little book, and it sounds morbid, but it's really about looking around and seeing what's the legacy that you want to leave for your people who have to come after you. So like, now is the time if you're not using something and you're not enjoying it, now's the time to pass it on to somebody who could use it.
Suzanne Wells:Exactly, yeah, absolutely, nothing wrong with that. But this is a common situation with elderly people that are either going to assisted living or who pass away suddenly, is dealing with all their stuff.
Unknown:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Listen, I'm doing it. We're still doing it. We still I have, I just sort of like anything that I thought could find a new house I would pack away. And so our garage is totally full. So we had to build a shed for my husband's tools when we moved in, because the garage is still full. I didn't, I didn't get to that stuff. I thought I would, and and I didn't. And so now I'm like, but I can't get rid of it like, I have to find, I have to find this people, right? And so and so when I source, I don't source a ton of stuff. I do clothing. I'll do jewelry if I see like vintage jewelry at the right price. I love plastic bangles. They can be worth a lot of money. Sometimes they're lose sight. Sometimes they're just plastic. But those 80s thick bangles people pay for and at the thrift store, they're like 50 cents. And on Long Island, 50 cents is like never seen. We have the most expensive thrift stores in the universe from all the people that I follow online and see what they're spending on things I can't imagine. I can't imagine it here. Sometimes we go down to North Carolina. My in laws are in Charlotte.
Suzanne Wells:Oh, really. Okay, we'll go
Unknown:all around there. They have a ton of good wells. We have maybe two good wells left on Long Island. That's it. They just closed them all down. We have, I don't know, maybe four salvation armies, maybe two in each county. And there used to be one, you know, you could throw a stone and you would hit one, and even independent throw. It's hard, it's hard to find stuff. Those little, tiny church thrift stores, they're usually only open maybe once a week. So if you're not off on that day, then you don't go, you know. But those are the ones that price cheap, and everybody else, they're, they're mostly like these big stores, and they'll put, you know, if they see anything with a Zara, it's going to be 20 bucks. We have a big thrift store by us called American thrift. I don't know if it's anywhere else in the country we
Suzanne Wells:have. They had some in Georgia. They were called America's thrift store, Yep, yeah, this is called
Unknown:American Thrift, and there's one here, and there's one out in Suffolk County, and it's huge. And they get a lot of new stuff all the time, but you'll be going through the racks, and there'll be a $70 sweater, an $80 sweater, and you're like, you know, like, I'm at, I'm at
Suzanne Wells:your thrift store price, $70 Oh, that same, yeah. Nobody
Unknown:didn't say that. So it's like, you know, if you know enough to find the thing that you're looking for, like, I could find wool blankets because they price some real, real cheap. And so I can get some old wool blankets that are worth, like, 100 bucks for $2 but, you know, maybe I'll do that two times, and by the third time I go back, they're now priced at$20 and so it's like, All right, well, that's not really going to be worth it for me, because I don't know if I can sell it. You know, I don't know enough. It's not a Pendleton. I don't know enough about it to see if I get, you know, for two bucks, I'll take the chance. And even any, anytime, like you're feeling that well made, you're like, Oh, this is well made. I don't know what it is. And then you look at it and it's like, 30 bucks, you're like, No, no, yeah, I can't take a chance on something I don't know. So I stick with, like, a lot of flannels and stuff like that. I won't normally buy dresses because they're just too expensive here, if like, so you guys had talked about two things that I have taken from the podcast and put into my own life, which was online auctions. I started looking at the Goodwill auctions, which I probably never would have done. I would have been like, this is crazy not to see what I'm getting. And I did eyeglasses. And so for 20 bucks, with the shipping, it was maybe 10 bucks. And 10 bucks shipping, I got a big box of eyeglasses, and I made, I don't know, maybe 60 bucks off that, and just donated what I couldn't use. And then, so then I did it again, and I made, I don't know, maybe, you know, maybe a profit of $60 maybe I made $80 altogether. But through that, I learned so much about eyeglasses, because I'm just looking at all the things reading about it. I looked at your videos on them, and learned about cleaning them and things like that. And so, like, it's, it's really interesting. And my husband's like, what are you doing with all these classes? Like, I get a box, and I'm looking, you know, I throw some to the side, I make, like, little piles. And he's like, What are you doing? And I was like, well, like, look at this one. Now I know this name is, you know, is important. It's not a brand name that I particularly know, but now I know, like, that's something to look for. These don't have a brand name, but they have to be old, so, like, maybe somebody I know will know about them. And the other one was silverware I never would have bought, like a bag of silverware. And then when we moved in this house, we all of our stuff was in storage, so we had gone to the thrift and bought some plates and some silverware just kind of get us through. I hate eating on paper. I think it's like the worst. And so the silverware that we bought ended up being, like, super old, and I sold it, you know, maybe we bought it for $1 for like, five forks, five spoons, five knives, and I sold it for like, 70 bucks on Facebook marketplace, and I never would have even thought to list it, even I listed it in both places, and it sold our marketplace for somebody who wanted to complete a set. It might have even been theirs because they were local, but
Suzanne Wells:they donated it, bought it back from you. Well, that's the thing is, I am guilty of, I thought all flatware had to be Sterling or really old, but I've seen so many posts where just your basic stainless flatware, it doesn't even have to be a complete set. You know, it can be pieces that somebody needs, like, you know, half of it got put in storage when we moved, and we don't even know where it is, and so we're just going to complete our set until we have time to go through the storage unit. Yeah. I mean, I
Unknown:think it's really interesting when people have those eBay stores and they have, you can pick what you want, you know, like, you pick a salad pork, and I'm like, one salad pork is $4 I'm going to sell
Suzanne Wells:a whole, like the multi quantity listing, where you have down and you can pick what you want. Yeah, great, because you can, buyers can just complete their set, or, you know, add to it. It if they want more, whatever, those are very convenient for buyers. Yeah, yeah.
Unknown:So it's interesting because I, I never would have gone for that. I that would be something I would never look at. I love dishes. I love platters. I love things with like weird or not weird, but like different patterns that I've never seen before. I love some of the like, 60s and 70s patterns. Sometimes I'll find something with, like hot air balloons on it, or, you know, some of those Danish ones, like, I love Danish pottery. Sometimes I'll find something and I'll be like, sesame Danish. And I just bought something. I bought this, like, two faced guy. It's like a bowl on top of a bowl, like a upside down bowl on top of a right side up bowl. And they have faces on them, like these little man, faces with pointy noses. And I was like, it has to be a Bjorn windlab, like it has to, has to, has to be, and it has no markings on it. So I did a Google reverse image search, and it isn't, you know, like it's, it would have to be marked to be by him, but it looks so much like it. And so I had bought it because I was like, Well, this is, like, hilarious and weird, and I like this little nosy person, but, and that's I, I can't resist either, like glasses holders, like vintage glasses holders, where you put your glasses on something.
Suzanne Wells:Yeah, it's like a head. It has like a face on it or something, right? I
Unknown:have dog ones, I have owl ones, I have face ones. I have just noses. I don't know why I have to, like, I am, like, I have to buy them. I could sell them, but I also, like, I just have to own them for a little while. You know, I like, I'm like, a troll.
Suzanne Wells:So wait back to that bowl on top of a bowl. What was the artist's name?
Unknown:There isn't it's unsigned. You said you thought it was somebody, Oh, I thought it was Bjorn windlad. It's B, J, O, R, N, and then the last name is W, I, I, N, B, L, A, A, D, and he's got this, like, real particular style of drawing, and he also did some sculptures. But the the way it would be, like you would buy these, like white plates with, like a teal, like a very beautiful teal print on them was, like a town or, like a bunch of people, and it was Danish, and I think they were from the 60s or 70s, but it might have even been the 80s, because I think you can still buy stuff that he made from the studio that he ran, but it's like a very once you see it one time, you'll never not see his thing. But they're usually signed. And I think maybe in the early 2000s I had bought a couple of things just because I was like, Oh, this is weird. I like, I like this, you know. And I would buy these, like things, and, like, I bought a, like, a cross stitch. Mona Lisa, you know? Because I was like, Oh, this is I like this, and I have this giant, Mona Lisa, I brought it to the library, and I was like, we can hang this here. And they were like, We don't want it. I was like, we're gonna hang
Suzanne Wells:you reject cross stitch. Mona Lisa,
Unknown:I was like, You guys have no idea the treasure you're rejecting, but it's I always bring my weird little things to the library, and I use them in like we do Bookstagram posts like for Instagram to advertise different books in the collection. So they usually have little props around them. So I'll bring in little things from my collection, and we'll use them, and then I bring them home and I sell them. So we always have a new influx of weird little props for for our staff. Sometimes I'll have, like, a bust or something that I'll, you know, I like, I will, I am like a troll, like, I just will be like, I have these things today. Look at my look at my treasures. And everybody goes, Oh, yes, these are nice treasures.
Suzanne Wells:Well, does your library do book sales?
Unknown:Do we do? I don't normally do books. I think because I get like, fatigue from it, because it feels like, then everything could be valuable. I could sell anything I like to buy. When I'm out at thrift stores, I love to buy used art books and like sketchbooks and photography books, because they don't, they don't run second prints on most of them. You know, they'll, they'll only run it for a year, and then it's over. So sometimes those are valuable, but also like, I try to, I try to buy everything. I like. I am my own best customer. So if it's sitting around my house for the next two years, I'm happy to look at it. And so there's almost nothing I think that I've bought besides clothes. Sometimes I'll buy clothes that I think are worth something, and then maybe they don't sell for whatever reason, like all my little chat keys and my jewelry and my like little paraphernalia. I don't even know what to call it. All my like stuff, my stuff, all of that is stuff that I like. I buy things that I think are fun, looking and attractive or interesting. So if I like it, then somebody like me likes it, right? And so you talk sometimes about how you wear, you know, you wear the things. And I 100% get that. I love cardigans because I'm a librarian. I think it's like, stereotypical, but totally true. I love it. And so I'll buy cardigans, and I'll be like, I'll buy them for me. And if I don't like them, I could just sell them, right? So I Thrift, I thrift probably, like, 100 cardigans a year, and I could wear a new cardigan every day, and no one would even notice. And because I'm thrifting them, I'll buy stuff that I probably wouldn't buy retail, you know, things that are louder, beadier, full of flowers and stuff like that. Maybe not my normal taste, but, you know, I'll give it a try, whatever. It's two bucks, and then, if not, I could sell it, because I'm gonna buy something that's a nice label. I'm gonna buy something that feels good. I'm not gonna buy a charming thing, you know. So I also, like, wear my inventory, because I'll be like, Oh, well, let me try this. Oh, it's not really for me. I'll sell it. So it makes me feel lucky, because it makes me feel like kind of wealthy, even if I'm not wealthy,
Suzanne Wells:right? Yeah, I have lots of choices. I get bored. I like having
Unknown:choices. Yeah, yeah. Well, and the thrifted necklaces and stuff like that I could wear, you know, these crazy beads, and just wear them one time, and I'm I'm selling them. I love to buy vintage necklaces. I love to, anytime I see something with a marking, if I don't know what it is, I'm happy to buy it for a few dollars. We went to Ireland this summer, and I went thrifting while we were in Galway, and we went to a couple of other cities that I got to thrift in. But over there, it is real different. It is so clean. There is no garbage, there is nothing hung up that is not pressed and beautiful.
Suzanne Wells:Oh, wow.
Unknown:I like, I couldn't I was like, But where's your junk? And they were like, This is our junk. I was like, where's your ghost? Up like, if it there was nothing that was stained there was, you didn't have to, like, look anything over, because everything was perfect. They weren't going to put it out if it wasn't perfect. And they, like, pressed it so they would have these, these, like racks of gown, not gowns, but like dresses, like work dresses, or like casual dresses, you know, not, not gowns. And they would be, maybe, I don't know, seven pounds, so that would be like 14, like 1011, $12 something like that, with the conversion. But they would be beautiful. You would be, you would be like, This must be new with tags, and they weren't. But they, you would have just assumed, no stains, no armpit, no you know, the zipper is great. Everything looks perfect. Um, so I was like, Oh, great. And they were always like, Bowdoin or Zara, or banana republic or, I mean, like, really beautiful brands that you couldn't imagine you would pay $14 for a dress in that condition here. And then they always had like, a lot of really interesting jewelry. They also had like, a lot of underwear, which I thought was weird, but I guess it was more like slips, a lot of slips put together, and bras and stuff like that. They didn't really have a lot of kids stuff that like, wasn't there. The ones that I went to that were all in Galway, some of the smaller villages that we went to would have an op shop, but it would be like or charity shop, but it would be like, just a few things not, it's not like we have here where it's like so much and so overwhelming and so but it was really interesting. And I got so I got some lighter clothes, and I got some jewelry that hadn't sold, but it's one some Isabella Morant. I hadn't known about her. I just bought it because I thought it was, like, pretty. It's like, these weird beads that I don't know what the rock I don't know what the stones are, and that has like some coral on it. Isabel morance, M, A, R, a, n, t, z, so she's like, a European. And there were tons of small label things too. Like I would have never known if I didn't look them up. I never heard of them, because in Europe, they have a lot of small labels, and people buy from their one store. You know, they'll go to Italy and go to this one store and buy from that designer. Hmm, okay, so it's really interesting. And they also like, they don't clean their clothes as much. So they like wear them very they like change when they get home. It's like, different than Americans we watch clothes so much, so they they don't. They seem to take care of their clothes differently than we
Suzanne Wells:do. Okay, better condition. Gotcha. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, do you want to talk about some things you've sold? Sure.
Unknown:So I recently sold a Murano glass sculpture that I got for about $20 in one of our thrift stores. It was like a it looked almost like an Emmy out of glass, and it was two people, and they were naked, holding each other's butts, and it was like, that's where their hands were, but and like, bald, you know? So it was like just two figures, and it had a sign on the bottom. It didn't say it was moral glass. It didn't have the sticker. I think it's like, a stupid way to mark something with a sticker, but so it but it was signed on the bottom, and I bought it in June, and it actually just sold last week. I was so excited, because it was, like my first over 100 to report to the group. Oh, and it was signed by Renato anatra, and it was really easy to read. So when I looked at it, and then I looked at the bottom, and I saw it was signed, and it it looked like a heavy piece of glass, and it didn't have any chips. So I was like, right, I'm going to buy this. I don't know what it is, but for clean box, it feels really heavy. It feels really significant. So I just like, then I did a Google reverse image search, and they were like, it's the lovers, it's Murano glass, and it's worth a billion dollars. I was like, great, a billion dollars. Well, it's not worth that much. But, yeah, there are so many variations of this particular thing. Murano glass had a series called The lovers, and has had it for many years. So this one was maybe me, this guy, Renato, a natural then I, like, found out all this stuff, you know? You go down the rabbit hole, and then you become, like an expert on this one thing, right? So this guy, Renato anatra, he he did these sculptures in the 40s and the 50s, but my two male figures, and then there are some that are two female figures, some that are a male and a female figure. They're they're naked, but it's just their backs. So, like, you really can't see anything. Some of them are like hugging. Some of them are like, holding each other. Some of them are definitely, like, in a, like, more passionate embrace, um, but they're all called the lovers. Some of them are like, have colored glass throughout them. Mine was totally clear. Some of them have hair, like, not hair, but, like, sculpted hair, like longer people. And so it was really interesting because there were a bunch of different artists that did it. And my guy probably was the least expensive.
Suzanne Wells:It was a lower end of the totem pole, right?
Unknown:But, but it was really interesting because, and it really it sat there for a long time, and it had a lot of watchers. And I would sort of play with the price a little bit, you know, I would send offers, and nobody took them, so I play with the price a little bit to try to revive it on their feeds and stuff. But I was like, You know what? It doesn't bother me. It could just sit there forever. It'll find its person like I don't, I don't have to sell it. It's not taking up a lot of space. So, and then it just sold this weekend. So it was great. And how much did it sell? For $150 plus shipping?
Suzanne Wells:Excellent. Good for you. Yeah,
Unknown:yeah. I was excited, because I really thought I was gonna have to drop it, drop it and drop it. It seemed, that seemed to be like kind of what it was going for, not that they were going that much, but there weren't any others on eBay at the time that I listed it. So that made me build up. I recently sold a Joseph Mazur, blue, turquoise glass bead necklace. It was we strung, so I only had listed it for $30 it was probably worth about $70 if it had been all original, but it was definitely we strong. And then I learned all about Joseph Mazur, m a z er Mazur, Mazur. It was like, Mazar, I don't know, but so the clasp was the thing that told me that it was very, very vintage, because, you know, the clasp was very ornate and had its own bead in it, and things like that. Oh yeah, that's where I'm like, Oh well, that's got to be old, because nobody does that now. Nobody has a fancy class. They don't put that kind of time and energy and and I sell a lot of vintage bracelets, of things that I have never seen, and I have no education on and I don't see anything like them on eBay. So so. Somebody knows what they're buying, but it's not me. I recently, so I love to buy Lucite stuff. So if I see any like Lucite desk, like desk organizers, or anything for the office, or anything that's like a sculpture or something for the living room, you know, I'll buy those all day. I recently got a business card holder. It looked like a fan, kind of and it was from guzne in Italy, Gene, Z, V, I n, I and I hadn't heard of them, but it was to me, definitely mid century or 70s. You could go either way, but I could see clearly that it said guzzini in Italy. So I was like, alright, well, I'll buy this. And I sold that for $14 and I bought it for $1 Okay, good, yeah.
Suzanne Wells:Now you tell the difference between lucide and just modern clear plastic plastic.
Unknown:You don't, I don't know. Okay, I make a guess on those things when it's old. I assume that it's suicide. So bracelets, so bangle bracelets and stuff like that. Those are hard, because you can definitely tell between Bakelite and Lucite, but Lucite and plastic, it's hard. So you to me, it's like a matter of dating, right? So if you can date it to the 50s and 60s, it's probably lose sight. The 70s, it's probably lose sight. The 80s, it's probably plastic, unless you can, unless you can tell who the maker is. But it's really hard, like so I have this one that I just bought. Oh, me, yeah, yeah. It's really cool, right? And it looks almost gold, but it's really yellow, but it's got a weird, like bubble here. It's got a bubble in it. And so to me, that's probably not plastic, because it doesn't show food to the back. I think that it's Lucite, but I'm not sure. So I'm not listing it yet, until maybe I can figure out something. I have, like, a I have a few things set aside to maybe join worth point and, like, get eval. I have these end papers. They were like, I put at an estate sale, these, like marbled papers. And I was like, Oh, this must be, like, wallpaper or something. Wasn't scrapbooky. It was older than that, but it doesn't have a backing. That's like, but it has a name across it. And the name across it, which I don't remember right now, is the name of a company that used to do book binding in in England, and they shut down in like, the 40s. So these end papers, which they were very famous for, these marble them papers. I have some. And now there's like, museums that use their old them paper prints as, like, the outside of things like that's like, they use the prints to, like, make notebooks and things like that. So I don't know if these are worth anything, but I like have to find somebody to evaluate them. But, like, I don't know any paper people, so I like put it aside. And I thought, well, maybe worth point. You know, worth point might be, it might be worth it to subscribe for a little while and see if I can get some
Suzanne Wells:Yeah, that's a good idea to put things aside and then just do a short term membership to look. Mm, hmm, yeah, they used to have a free trial, or a trial with 10 lookups or something. I don't know if they still do that. I
Unknown:did, you could. I had bought once, like an abalone brooch. It was like a lady's face, but no face, like, like a head, but it was definitely a lady, and it had, like a, almost like a, another piece over it, hat and like something else, maybe lips. But I couldn't tell what, what they were. I didn't, I couldn't find anything about it. And so I, I paid the 40 bucks for, like a one time, you know, appraisal. And the information I got back was amazing. Like, it really was, like, very thorough, and they they had appraised it at, I think, $80 but they didn't really have any information on they were going off of, like, comps and things that were like it, and what they thought, because you just send pictures, you know, and what they thought that it was. So sometimes at the library, we'll get an antique appraiser in. So then I always, I'm like, oh, maybe I'll bring Oh, yeah. And, but so when I sold it, I was able to send the papers with it. So I was like, Hey, I did get this appraised. So if you want to know more about what this this person said, but it wasn't worth the money that I paid for the appraisal to then sell it, you know, like, by then, I wasn't really making a lot of money after it, but I thought, like, I've never seen anything like this, and I even went to a couple of jewelers. That I that are local. And I was like, Have you ever seen anything like this? Like, do you know somebody who might be able to tell me more about it? And they, they were like, I've never seen anything so and even the class was weird. Like, everything about it was really different than anything I'd ever seen. They thought it came from maybe South America. So, oh, okay, yeah. Like, maybe it was like, a handmade there, and that's why the class was so made weird, because it was like a handmade clasp, like a forged metal clasp,
Suzanne Wells:right? Right?
Unknown:Bookends. I love bookends. I buy bookends every time I see em. I love that's
Suzanne Wells:not surprising for a library,
Unknown:right? Yes, that is, that's the thing. I love book ends. I'll never not love book ends. I love it when they match. I love it when they don't match. I could buy hundreds of them, and I sell them quite a bit. I like mid century, modern, you know, a lot of them are just like two pieces of teak,
Suzanne Wells:right? Together.
Unknown:You know, very simple, yeah. I have a very cool A to Z that I've had for a long time,
Suzanne Wells:right? She's holding up an A to Z tokens. Is that wood? Pink
Unknown:wood, and they're, like, kind of curvy, yeah, they're and I've had them for a really long time, and now I'm ready to sell them so and let someone
Suzanne Wells:else enjoy them, right? Yes,
Unknown:yeah. I like, I pivot in and pivot out. Thinker bookends. They're
Suzanne Wells:not thinking, okay, yeah,
Unknown:they're not rare. But a bunch of them were sold. They were made in the 1920s and they have the date on them because they're, I don't do you know how like, bronze is made. So, like, they do a cast, first plaster cast, and then they do the bronze casting. And so these ones are bronze cast thinker bookends made in like, 1928 and there's many for sale all over the world. Like, it's not, they're not super duper rare. But I had them for a while, and then I was like, Alright, I'm gonna sell these, you know, because I've already enjoyed them, and now I will get, you know, I will find new book ends. Because I always feel like, if I sell stuff, it'll, I'll find it again, or I'll find something better, you know what I mean? And so it's like, I got to see it. I even have, like, a little Instagram where I put stuff that I think is cool, because then it's like, I have it forever and I don't, right, you
Suzanne Wells:know? Well, one thing I've noticed about bookends is like, if they're cast iron or they're super heavy, it's like a Hus can be really heavy to ship. So I like the the lighter weight wooden or just smaller sculpture looking things that are interesting but not super heavy, like it doesn't weigh 25
Unknown:pounds, yeah, yeah, well, but then the ones that weigh 25 pounds, they don't really get broken.
Suzanne Wells:You know, that's true, good point. Yeah, I'd rather
Unknown:that's gonna break that glass sculpture. I was like wrapping it and wrapping it and wrapping it, wrapping it again, wrapping it again, putting it in a bag, putting it in another wrapping. I would just little determined for it not to break, because I am, that's and that's why, like, I won't do planters on eBay, because I just know I'm not gonna successfully pack it.
Suzanne Wells:I'm right. There's no way. There's a risk there, even if it's perfectly packed, there's just always that risk. Yeah, that's why there's insurance, yeah.
Unknown:But I definitely, I definitely, buy stuff and with stuff according to whether or not I want to pack it, right?
Suzanne Wells:Oh, everybody does, yeah, absolutely. Some people just don't care. They'll pack anything. Oh, yeah. Oh, let me think about this for a minute. Is that worth the is the potential selling price worth the hassle, aggravation of packing if you don't really like to do it?
Unknown:Yeah? Yeah, yeah, that's stuff I always get real nervous about. My son loves Pokemon. I have become an expert in the things that my 10 year old son has loved over the last 10 years. So I know a lot about transformers, and if you can find old transformers, they're worth a lot of money, but transformers sold the or a Chinese company in China bought the original molds for transformers and have been manufacturing them since then under another name, but it's the it's the same transformers, so you have to find the ones that are the original. But that's not what I'm going to talk about. So Pokemon. He really loves Pokemon. And so we went to Pokemon Go fast. You go with a bunch of other people who love Pokemon, and you catch pokemon in one place, and they like, plant all these Pokemon. It's all over the phone. It doesn't make any sense to people who don't do it, but it's an event, right? So there's a Pokemon event, and we got t shirts from it. Maybe the T shirts were 10 bucks with the ticket. That was, like, very expensive. But they they have these limited. T shirts. So my husband, my son, and I had all gone and so 1t shirt was is worth like 85 or$90 on eBay, because it only happens in like two places in the world, and you can only get them if you go to the fest. So I have sold two of the T shirts. Now, my husband says that he's keeping his. We'll see. We'll see how that works out. But wait for him to leave
Suzanne Wells:and then, you know, go in there.
Unknown:Yeah, but, but that's been, like, a really easy way. I mean, we listed it for seven. The first one we listed for, I think, $80 and it sold pretty quickly. The other one we have for 75 I think. And it's not as quick, because it's probably not I think it's a small because that's what size my son was. But that was like, an interesting thing for me, because I never would have assumed that my husband had a t shirt in the garage that was that literally in the garage, from the white from the wire TV show. I don't know how he got it. I don't know what it was, from some kind of promotional thing. One of our friends was, like, a key grip on that show, and just had, like, a bunch of T shirts, and it's worth like, 150 or $200 because it's like, this one particular t shirt. Like, I am not a t shirt, bro. I don't know a lot about T shirts. I see them. I don't understand the double stitching, single like, none of it makes any sense to me. But this is one of those T shirts I have it listed for $150 we have watchers on it, and I'm like, one day somebody's gonna buy it, and it's a t shirt, so I could sit on it forever. Hey,
Suzanne Wells:bump the price up 10 bucks and see if anybody makes a move. I've
Unknown:done it a couple of times, like they're just seeing if there's another one on there, but, oh, maybe, yeah, maybe they have one too, and they're just seeing what yours, yeah. But I always leave the offers open, because, you know, I don't I don't mind it. I don't mind getting an offer. So,
Suzanne Wells:okay, well, it sounds like you have quite an eclectic mix of things. How many items you have for sale? Like around 230
Unknown:Okay, that's healthy, good. Yeah, I don't have a store at this moment in time, it's like a little bit more than I can wrap my head around, right?
Suzanne Wells:There's a threshold of where it becomes more financially advantageous to have a store, and the store is just it's how you build your listings. You can run sales and markdown manager things like that that are available to you that you don't have store.
Unknown:Yeah, I think for me, it's like smarter to spend my time maybe going through my older listings to see if I want to keep them up or retool them. Or sometimes I there's things that I have literally just thrown up, you know, with terrible pictures because I just didn't have time, and I just want to get it up there. And sometimes it's worked out great, and sometimes it hasn't. So going back and maybe taking new pictures is not a waste of time for me, because it it might be the thing that helps it, you know,
Suzanne Wells:right, absolutely right. Okay, well, you've just been a wealth of knowledge today. Thank you so much for sharing all of that. And what are you up to later today?
Unknown:Well, I'm going thrifting today. Fridays are my day off. So, like, on my store, I say I only ship on Tuesdays and Fridays because I work on Saturdays. I'm the Saturday librarian. So Fridays is my day to, like, do all my chores. I have, like, one thing to ship I don't do, like, pickup. I don't do, I don't print my things ahead of time I go to the post office. I'm pretty late, but I'm also, like, super disorganized. So it's like, this is the way my brain works, and I gotta, you know, I have to do it in this order. It doesn't make sense to me. Otherwise, I have ADHD. And so I think that's like, part of my like, I'm so interested in so many things because I, like, get hyper focused on them, and then I'm like, I learn about that thing for a little while, you know? And even, like, my son has taught me, like, about his little whatevers. And so he'll come to the thrift store with me, and he'll always find because he's looking for just his name, right? Yeah, he's always like, Oh, look at this dragon ball thing I found. I'm like, alright, you know, because I'm the he's the same way as me. So apple trees make apples, you know?
Suzanne Wells:So you have a day off from the library. You're gonna go thrifting and have a you day, that's what. No, okay, well, thanks so much again for coming on and sharing everything. And I think I'm going to title this the eclectic librarian.
Unknown:Oh, I like it. I like it. Okay? I listen to that
Suzanne Wells:episode. Alright. Sounds great. Well, enjoy your day, and we'll see you on Facebook. Book. Thank you so much. Okay, bye. And now for some parting words, let me clarify the numbers regarding eBay store subscriptions. These have changed over the years, so the numbers are just all jumbled up in my head, you can always check these on the eBay help pages for what's current. So there's the starter store, which I don't really recommend. This eBay says is best for sellers who have a handful of products and want a storefront to brand and promote their business. So it's 495 a month. With the annual subscription, you get 250 listings a month, and once you go over that, it's 30 cents per listing. And you don't really get any benefits. You don't get the store coupon for $25 in supplies that comes out every quarter. You don't get access to features like markdown manager, where you can run sales, and it's really just for your branding. So most at home sellers have the basic store, and this one is 2195 a month. With the annual subscription, you get 1000 fixed price listings a month, and then it's 25 cents insertion fee for any listings over 1000 so that includes any listings you have that are rolling over for another 30 days, as well as what you're adding. You get 250 free auction listings and select categories. So you have to go to that help page and see what those categories are. Sometimes I run auctions and I'm charged because the item is not in those select categories. So that's where we stand. With the store subscriptions that most at home sellers use, and with the basic store, you do get that quarterly coupon for $25 worth of eBay branded shipping supplies. So that's a good perk. And then you get other features, like the markdown manager, where you can run sales. So that's where we are as of February, 26 2025 it's probably going to change again in the future, but that's where we are for now. Okay, next week, my guest is Monica, who sells on eBay part time. She also has an antique booth and a full time job. So she is a busy lady. You will learn a lot from her, so you don't want to miss that episode. And thank you all for supporting this podcast and tuning in every week. Keep plugging along. The next sale could be any time now, and remember, it can't sell if it isn't listed, so tackle those piles. Have a great day. Talk to you next week. Bye, everybody. You