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
eBay Seller Chat with Wendy the Entrepreneur In Connecticut ❤️
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Hey, there, eBay friends, you have landed on episode number 265 of eBay the right way. Today's date is April 15, 2026 and my guest is Wendy in Connecticut. Announcements, I'm very excited about my new project that has launched. I'll tell you about it at the end of the podcast. So now let's hear from Wendy. Hello listeners, and welcome back. And I have Wendy, who is kind of known as the jewelry lady on the Facebook group. How are you doing this morning? Wendy? Good, happy
Unknown:to be back. Thank you for inviting me.
Suzanne Wells:Yes, we were looking through the records and you were on as a solo episode back in 21 and then you were part of the estate sale episode, which was in 23 so we're just kind of checking back in to see what you've been up to and remind us where you live.
Unknown:I am in Connecticut. I'm actually currently in Southport. I grew up in Westport, so next town over at the moment I have, I'm renting over here. So okay,
Suzanne Wells:well, hey, renting is the way to go, especially if you're a single lady, then you don't have to fix anything. You just call the property management. I love that part of it. So do you want to catch us up a little bit what's been going on with you and your life and your eBay business over the last few years? So you, I think
Unknown:you probably noticed I took a little bit of a hiatus from the group as well last year. So we sold our childhood home in August of 2024 and so it was sort of a reset after that, and I was just really exhausted. It was a 10 year journey of, you know, caretaking parents, covid the house, I kid you not. My mom had a million items in that house. I still have a storage unit. It's not big, but I still have, like, silver and things that I'm just for right now, keeping in case the price goes up. But yeah, it was just a really exhausting process. So I in 2024 was by far the hardest. Just getting the house empty, getting it on market. We had a oil spill on the property. So it was, it was chaos. I don't even know how we did it. We have no air conditioning. It was 100 degrees per house.
Suzanne Wells:You lose both parents close together a year apart. Okay? So, yeah, I went through that too. Mine. I lost a bunch of people within two years. And unless you've been through it, it just you don't realize the toll it takes on you, mentally, emotionally, physically, it's it's hard, and you know, after you you dealt with all that, and then all their possessions and everything, and, yeah, step back and take a break and regroup, because it's just exhausting.
Unknown:Yeah, it was a lot. And for our sake, luckily for us, our dad passed before covid. So then the journey was, covid in the house, lockdown in the house, right? So, yeah, our dad literally passed, like end of 2019 so we came into 2020 thinking we were going to have a very different future. Hello, and behold. So yeah, it was just, it was really long. It felt very life changing. All good. But you know, when you're going through it, it's very heavy, very emotional, all of the different things we had to handle, and the estate as well. If sometimes I think, you know, covid and the estate were harder than the caretaking. So just because, well,
Suzanne Wells:and it's, it's, you okay, well, we have to do this thing. And you go to do it, whether it's the estate or the caregiving, and then, you know, it's five more hoops you have to jump through to make that happen. And it's just a constant pull on your your time, and it just takes up room in your head. Congratulations for making it through that and pulling your life back together. Because is is it just you and your sister? Are there more siblings?
Unknown:It is. It's just me and my sister. My sister moved back to Santa Fe, where she used to live before, and she wants to kind of settle somewhere out there. She's not sure. She's thinking Colorado, she she's not quite sure where she wants to kind of get property and what's really affordable and what would be the best, right? So I've stayed here. This is really expensive, so I don't quite know that you're in one of the more expensive states. Yeah, especially this area. It's. Where I grew up. So it's where my parents moved, you know, before I was born. So, you know, they lived here their whole, you know, young adult lives up to, you know, so,
Suzanne Wells:yeah, and it's hard to leave the familiarity of where you know, you know, everybody, you have friends, you you know, and it's just familiar, and then to just uproot and go somewhere that's not familiar, that's tough.
Unknown:Well, actually, you know, I lived in California for 12 years, so this has been, this has been more unfamiliar for me because I left, you know, I graduated college, I moved to the city, lived in the city, and then I went out to California for 12 years, and then came back here. So my life was in California, and I moved back, like, not really knowing anybody, and I have community, but like, it's been hard to kind of, you know, develop friendships and stuff, especially with everything we were doing is very isolated. So, but yeah, so I don't have, like, a ton of attachments to this area, but I have certain things I do and certain things that are keeping me here at the moment. So I think, you know, I'll stay in the Northeast. I'm not sure. The only other place I want to live is Europe, and that's not really viable.
Suzanne Wells:Well, you never know what might happen. Some handsome prince might sweep you all, yeah, take you back to the country, and you never
Unknown:to Scotland. Hopefully, I wanted to spend time in Scotland. So okay, okay.
Suzanne Wells:So recap, when you got into
Unknown:eBay, I sold a little bit in California, but not as a reseller like I use. I think, like most people, you probably just had an item, one or here and there that you just kind of put up like in the old days of eBay. That was before 2013 but then once I moved back here, we had our parents collection, really, with my mom's my dad had stuff too, and it was just massive. It was everything. And we sold a variety of ways, but one of them was eBay, and so I had gone to work for a competitor when I moved back to New York, and that wasn't working out this working out. There's just too much to handle. So I had to leave the job. And I was like, hey, what am I going to do? My sister's like, eBay. Okay, so I started, I continued with the store I had the enchanted Fox, which is my parents, right? Okay, well, I guess to call my parents store. That's where I sell their stuff. And then in 2017 to save my sanity, I launched a store devoted to jewelry, because I wanted something I was interested in selling. I'd been selling all of their things. Some were interesting, but some of it was just not my passion. I'm like, it's really hard to sell something you're not as enthusiastic about, and a lot of it is so much research because they were antiques. And my mom collected so many different things, I had to become an expert in such a wide variety of stuff, like Japanese art mid century, you know. And my mom, her focus was samplers and needlework. My sister handled a lot of that, so we had like 500 samplers in the house, but, oh god, I still have a case of thimbles, but the thimbles are valuable. There's some that are gold. There's some that are ivory that I can't sell. They're in storage. They're really small. They're just, like, just too much. The hallmarks are way too small. So some of those things I've just, they're on the back burner. But you know, most stuff is, I have a very small storage unit. It's not like, I have a ton of stuff. I have some artwork, and that's it. And the coin Silver Spoon collection. So, yeah, started selling jewelry in 2017 and I didn't initially start on eBay with that. I actually started a Shopify store in Etsy because I thought this might be a better avenue for the jewelry. And Shopify didn't work out, because it was hard to build an audience. I didn't realize I was not going to have any traction with that. And then Etsy, it took about three months for my first sale. And I like Etsy, but it wasn't going to work long term. So I put some stuff at Etsy, but then I started on eBay, and then I got my first sale, and then just kind of kept on focusing on eBay for the jewelry. So about nine years on eBay, or eight, eight and a half, okay, late 2017,
Suzanne Wells:so, well, your mom sounds like a very interesting person. Was, what was her background? Was she an artist?
Unknown:She went to the My parents met the University of Wisconsin, and after college, she worked at the Chicago Art Institute, which she loved, yeah, she loved that. She was very much into Japanese art. She She studied Japanese, like watercolor brush paintings. We had a lot of Japanese influences in our house. And then my dad was in advertising and sort of food products as well. So there was a lot of relocation out to this area. I think he was working with like post cereals and some American can. I think I'm trying to remember the exact it was before I was born, but I think American cam was the company that brought him out, out to the east coast here so and then got into real estate,
Suzanne Wells:such a massive collection of needlework and art and just interesting pieces, I was like, no, she sounds like she has an art background.
Unknown:Yeah, she did. And my sister is a graphic designer, and yeah, so yeah, there's like an influence in our house. And we grew up going to lots of things throughout the Northeast, like Historic Places. We'd go to museums. You know, it's kind of very cultural stuff growing up, so it did have a large influence.
Suzanne Wells:Now, are you working like a regular job too, or you just Ebay.
Unknown:I am trying to because I've been working so much from home, and I did prior to moving back here. I had a I worked as a speaker agent for eight years. I booked speakers for events around the world, and half of it because of where I was in the North Bay, and had to commute to the South Bay. They let me work in the office three days, and from home too. And that was kind of a nice balance of seeing people and then having home. But being home all the time is kind of driving me crazy. So I'm, yeah, I like, I like the freedom of being able to set my own schedule, but, you know, not seeing people, you know, the covid era, the caretaking. It's been a long time of not really having a round of a lot of a people, other than being out in the world as much as I used to be. So yeah, I've been applying for different jobs. I'd like to find something like 2530 hours a week, and then still do eBay. And then I'm also trying to work on some creative projects and move in some other directions as well. I think I'll always sell jewelry. It's just hard to do eBay full time. I don't want to be on the computer all day long, and it's a lot. I love sourcing and research, but I really don't like the photographing, editing
Suzanne Wells:well, and when you're only eBay, and that's your only source of income. That's a little stressful, because, you know, some months are better than others. You can't really count on a certain amount of money all the time, so I get that, and it's good to be out and be social as well, as much as you want. Some people were like, Oh, I'm with too many people all the time. I gotta pull back on that. But it's a balance. Sounds like you're you're trying to find that balance. So I love that coffee cup in your background
Unknown:with the cat. Oh, thank you. So this is one of the things I started. Was a print on demand, and I have to say, it has been really hard to do. So that was a design that I created,
Suzanne Wells:cats with a heart in between.
Unknown:Yeah, I'll get your address after. I'll send you one. And then this one, it's the love, the love magnet mug.
Suzanne Wells:Well, my mug is what I found at Goodwill for $1 from the eggs up grill. So I started, I don't want to say collecting, but when I moved this time, I just really, I'm like, I'm not packing it, moving it, if I can replace it quickly and easily, because I'm going to be in thrift stores anyway, so I'm like restaurant mugs, just to make a little more fun. In the morning, when I'm drinking my coffee, I'm pretending I'm at the eggs up grill. So okay, well, do you want to talk about some things you've sold recently? Have you gone in different directions? Are you sticking with the jewelry?
Unknown:What's happening there? Well, so the jewelry sort of had a bit of a revival. So I did take a lot of 2025 off. To be honest, I was just exhausted, and I would I had about 300 items. Still. People may wonder why I have two stores, but I really want to keep the jewelry separate, even though I could combine it with my mom's stuff. So I I literally had about 300 items in each store that I just kept there and relisted throughout the year, but I didn't add a lot. So 2025 was kind of a bit of a non existent, sort of business wise now I'm kind of getting back into it again, and I've had a lot of money, actually, my best sale ever in January. So it was, and I knew you'd ask this, I had to write, but I took a little bit less of a commission. So, and I know you may ask at one point about sourcing, this is a unique thing, and I'll explain it when we get to that, if we get to that question, but I was consigning jewelry for someone, and I had had her jewelry, I had sold about half of it, but I had some of her key pieces, the more expensive ones still listed, because people would want to, like, low ball you, and because they want to resell it. And I did still end up selling it to reseller. She's an antiques dealer, but she she must have a more, higher venue that she can flip this. But it was three Christian Lacroix pieces, so it was two necklaces and a pair of earrings, and it was $2,600
Suzanne Wells:Oh, oh,
Unknown:did you put that on the group? I think I did. Yeah, okay, I might put it in the non 100 thing,
Suzanne Wells:but I did a lot to keep up with in that group of look. Looking through. I don't look through every single thing. I just sort of glance over it. But there's usually 200 posts on the regular money making Monday. So that's a lot to scroll through,
Unknown:but it is, yeah. So what
Suzanne Wells:was your commission? What percentage did
Unknown:you I did? Normally, I would have done 20% or 30. We had a different deal based upon, this is my first time really doing this with somebody. I can explain that more, but I think I did 20% on that, or maybe 15, because she was giving the money to her brother. And I had her jewelry for a while, and my focus had shifted with the closing of our house and all this stuff, and I kind of felt like, Okay, I should have moved her jewelry by now, you know? So it was kind of like, yeah, I just sort of worked out a deal with her, but most of the other jewelry that I had was 20 to 30% I know some people take a higher commission on consignments, and it was a learning experience for me. If I was to do this again, I'd only focus on the higher price jewelry. I had taken smaller stuff, and it was just like minutia, and a lot of her jewelry required repairs. My sister's really sweet. She repaired so much of it. They were beautiful pieces, but everything was like missing stones. And I'm like, Oh my gosh. How did I end up with 14 pieces?
Suzanne Wells:Well, and back to the the commission part. Some sellers do, like a sliding scale on the really expensive items they don't take as much, yeah. Or, since jewelry so easy to ship, you don't have to factor in time, like if you were shipping 20 piece set of china or something like that, where there's some significant time involved in packing it. Jewelry is pretty fast.
Unknown:It is. But I did a really lovely box. I went to, I think I got it at home goods, or Michaels, actually, I don't think it was home goods, a beautiful, like, really nice box, and I packaged this all beautifully, sent it to the woman. She didn't even leave a review. Oh, no. Nicest packaging I do. Do nice packaging. I get nice I just get, like, craft boxes, but everything's in burlap bags. And that's a great idea. Yeah, I had one person. She just my basic packaging. She posted a photo. She's like, I love this. It was so lovely to receive because I don't do the padded mailers. I kind of just do a really, just nice, simple, but eco friendly packaging. But, yeah, it was funny because I didn't get any feedback. I was like, okay, it's okay. But I really it was a
Suzanne Wells:really nice box. You know that you went the extra mile and you made it beautiful. I always say, no news is good news. So it's true. Don't, don't poke the bear and say, Did you like this? Can you leave feedback? I just, I never do that, because I don't want to purge them to like, be critical and, well, it was good, except this one thing. And, you know, just leave it alone.
Unknown:So, so I did want to abs. I think this is a unique way of sourcing. And I don't know if anybody's mentioned this? Because this sort of fell into my lap, and I haven't pursued it, really, because I don't need more stuff. I have a lot of jewelry to sell. I actually, in case you asked about anything, I have like, six trays of jewelry right here that I need to work on. But the whole this woman Betsy, it came about because I went to a gold and silver buyer here to liquidate some stuff. And I was mentioning I sell costume jewelries like people come in here all the time and they don't know what to do with their costume jewelry. He started referring people to me, and I didn't even know hard. So people started calling me like I heard you. I met with a bunch of people, so I the cat is out of the bag if you're near a golden jewelry silver buyer. Take, go meet with them, drop off your business cards and develop a relationship. I, you know, I need to go back to them. I don't need to source anything, so I haven't, kind of reopened that relationship. But it was funny, because after that, I literally was getting calls right and left of people and and I met with a few, but betsy's is the only jewelry that I took, because other people, it was like they just weren't sure what they wanted to part with, you know, do I buy it all? Do I sell it for them? Because this process with Betsy was several years, you know, not everything moves on eBay really quickly, and I'm trying to get her the top dollar. I'm not going to undersell her stuff. So I was holding out for the right but, and she was happy with that sale. You know, the jewelry was priced a little bit higher. It should have been like another 1000. I think it was like 1500 or so per necklace, or maybe 1750 so, you know, but at this
Suzanne Wells:well, that is a great idea, because I've never thought about that the gold and silver you're talking about a store that's like, we buy gold, yeah, we
Unknown:have a few of them in this area, but there's like, an independent one up the way, and I did have some silver I was trying to melt, or just kind of do something with, and I brought it there, and, you know, I told him I sold jewelry. And yeah, and lo and behold,
Suzanne Wells:I started. So, yeah, I bet they get all kinds of stuff. They're they don't want to take
Unknown:on it. They can't take costumes. They can't melt, right?
Suzanne Wells:It's not valuable enough. They don't and it's their time. Time, you know they've gotta deal with it. So that is a very smart way to get some customers. Is the ones they don't want to take or they can't take. And I bet they like having someone to refer their customers to. You always try to if the answer is no, no, I can't do that, but I can do this, and then that gives them a way to help that person find a solution. So good for you. So are you pretty much sticking with jewelry now? Are you doing other things too? I am, as I said, I launched the
Unknown:print on demand last year, and that's been its own challenge to learn, and I won't spend too much time on them, because I know your audience is probably is probably not listening for that part.
Suzanne Wells:Now, everybody's looking for more streams of income. So are you doing it through Amazon?
Unknown:No, through Etsy. So, but it's a learning curve to a I'm designing stuff with AI. You can print it on anything. I've tried mugs, tote bags, magnets. I have cute coasters too. Got I did the same design on a set of four coasters. So little coasters. But it's hard because there's, what, 13 million, I don't know how many listings on Etsy, and you just get drowned out in that. And a lot of what sells on Etsy is personalization. It can be really simple, but a lot of wedding stuff like, you can customize, like so and so, you know, Emily and Jack, you know, and their date, their wedding and all of that. So it's a lot of customization that sells on it.
Suzanne Wells:Yeah, I bought Christmas ornaments customized with a very specific thing. It always comes out great, and I have no complaints, but I've never really thought about putting something out there. How do you know what, what to put in your design? That's, do you look at what's trending? Do you ask chat? GPT, how do you figure out what is in demand?
Unknown:Well, this is kind of funny. I because of recent years and because of the way the world has been, I've been sort of on the sending out the love frequency, out into the world. So that has been, that's love focus. So everything is sort of putting out, like love themed products. Maybe that's not what people want a Valentine's Day, but I did sell this is actually really cute. It's, sorry, it's in plastic wrap, but it's sort of a picking out. It's plastic. It's a journal, but it's, it's called the lovers. It's based on a tarot deck. So I did sell
Suzanne Wells:one of those. And for the listeners, that has sort of a drawing or watercolor of maybe Victorian style.
Unknown:Yeah, it's, sorry, I hope you can see all but, yeah, it's Victorian style, like Edwardian style, and then it's just a ruled notebook and but it's the quality, it's the printing, because I've used printify. So when you use printify, there's, like, you know, so many different printers, and you have to learn, like, who to use, and you have to get samples. Some people don't, but I get samples of every product because they all print differently. The colors the print, right?
Suzanne Wells:And I pick those up when I see them out in thrift stores, if they're not Date Specific, if it's just a journal or a planner, that it's not for a certain year, but it's it's high quality, maybe the cover is that fabricy kind of stuff, and I've sold those before. People are looking people like to do the or the Smash books and the journaling, and just because everything is digital now doesn't mean people don't want to write.
Unknown:Yeah, so, and I think the next thing I'm going to try, and this has become really popular, and people may want to try this, because I think there's different avenues. And I watched this guy. I know you're so very entrepreneurial. There's a young guy named Chris corner. His last name is K, o, e r, N, E R, and he has a podcast. He's on Instagram, but he always he just shows people making money in so many different ways. It's called the corner podcast, or the corner office or something like that. But I don't know if you follow the flower letters, but they make they're on board to make $15 million this year, and it's a whole whole she started as one set of letters, and now they have a whole team, but those are the ones where they recreate, like a story set in another time, and you get mailed a letter once a month. Oh, okay, right. So there's a lot of those, but what's become really popular is this thing called Snail mail clubs like this has been the thing of the last year, and some people do their own artwork and they send a letter. Some it's like very young audience to excuse to the really, like young, like 20s, something where they're doing stickers and things like that. They mail them out. But people have, like, 6000 you know, mailings a month, and like, $10 a pop you know, whatever their take out of that is $7 $8 that adds up. One woman, she's making, like, 50,000 a month.
Suzanne Wells:That's fantastic. I've seen something like that, where it's like from the grandparents to the grandchildren talking about their lives. And I personally love. Snail mail. When I go check my mail, 90% of it is just junk, and it goes right into the recycler there at the mailbox and to get a handwritten letter from somebody or something that's personal, because we've all, we're all in those you know, where you get emails and it's just recycled content, and everybody just copies you in, and it's, I don't read any of that. Just, in fact, I have started this letter writing campaign of and I think this is because of all the deaths in my family, things I want to say to people while they're still here. And like, I wrote one to my, I guess, ex mother in law a few weeks ago, and just, you know, thank you for being such a good grandparent to my children. And I named several instances where, you know, she was there for me, she showed up for me. She helped me with my babies. And you know, we haven't spoken in in years because I divorced kind of out of that family. But you know, I want people to know this before it's too late, so I have several on my list of you know, thank you for doing this very specific thing for me. Years later. I appreciate it. I appreciate you. You may not be close now, but I wanted you to know this, and it's really more for me than for them. Just to you know, when you lose family members, there's regrets. Of you didn't say this and you didn't say that, and I just, I don't want that happening anymore. So I'm on board with the personalized letters. And so those that you're talking about, how does that work? You sign up for a certain type of letter.
Unknown:You can, like a lot of people. They seem to list them on Patreon, ho fi or Shopify. They create, they already have a following on Instagram. A lot of it's on Tiktok, which, I don't stay away from Tiktok, but it is amazing the virality, or virality, however you pronounce it, of Tiktok, you know, just put something on there, and you just can kind of go into the stratosphere, but it's a lot of artists, like a lot of people, that they may reproduce their work. If somebody can't buy it as a canvas, they'll reproduce it as a card and they'll mail that out. But the woman who, if you go the corner podcast, if you've got Instagram or his YouTube channel, Chris corner, you'll see his interview with the woman in Texas, and she started just at her farmers market, and she just started sending out a letter of, like, kind of observations, a recipe card. And it grew. It just grew, I think she literally, she's running the business now with her husband and family. And, no, it's really amazing, but it just grew out of a passion for wanting to connect with her community and share more and build more community in our area, and so I think there is a return in this. AI is great and technology is great, but I think people are overwhelmed. And I think there is kind of a one a return to the analog era, or even
Suzanne Wells:it's just more personal and it's real. There's so much out there, like the reels and stuff that those aren't even real people. They're AI generated grandmas and uncles and they just, you know, make an AI reel, and it's not even a person. And sometimes it's hard to tell, but I was like, I'm taking advice from something that's made up. No, give me a psychologist. Give me somebody who, really does this for a living to give me advice, but I don't know. I think we're seeing gonna start seeing a backlash to AI stuff, because it is, there's just so much of it, and it's overwhelming, and it is, people want real connections. They want real emotions, and not just anybody can sit there and make up a grandma giving advice. Anyway, we kind of got off the topic. I'll spin
Unknown:it back to jewelry, and because I don't think I'm going to follow through with this, so maybe one of the listeners, or somebody who has a YouTube channel who already has a built in audience, but I actually thought about doing one for jewelry, like my finds each month. You know, the store is called a treasure Fox, so like the monthly jewelry and then going into a little bit the history of the piece where I sourced it, but I actually, I don't want to go in that direction. But yeah, I really think it's if somebody wants to run with my idea, because I don't think I'm going to follow through. And I think there's room, obviously, for more than one person to do it, but I don't think anybody's doing jewelry snail mail. So I thought about monthly fines, and I did illustrations. I did a test one last night of an illustration of I got these beautiful these are Navajo Sterling earrings, and I did them as an illustration. I was like, I can go into the designer. So people get a mailing each month and they'll know about who this designer is, somebody who's interested in jewelry. It'd be a very specific audience. But you do an E, you know, you do an email a newsletter template, you print it out. And I could do snail mail, but I probably do that on Etsy, and I couldn't, I don't think I do that on eBay. What is
Suzanne Wells:your Do you mind sharing your Etsy store name?
Unknown:Oh, that's that's closed. Oh, you mean my, my jewelry
Suzanne Wells:store, whatever you're doing
Unknown:on Etsy? Oh, that's because it's called. Love and bloom shop. It's called Love and bloom shop.
Suzanne Wells:I mean, that's you're on the podcast. You might as well. Adventures are people like to investigate
Unknown:that, but I meant for jewelry. So, like, that's if I was to do, like, a jewelry snail mail, I would do that on my old Etsy store, which is related, because this one's like mugs and journals.
Suzanne Wells:You're multifaceted. People on the group. Know you for your jewelry postings, but you've everybody's multifaceted. I don't want to pigeonhole you, and it's like, Wendy's only the jewelry seller.
Unknown:No, you're okay. That's what I tend to post. I didn't, you know I had a lot of huge sales at one point when I was in your group, and I didn't post them, because they were my mom's stuff, and I didn't I had one point it was, it was an astrological configuration, because I honestly, I had like, three mega sales in a row. This was years ago. It was my mom. They were old dental tool kits, like antique dental sets, and I had specific collectors and and then I had these shaker, you know, the stereograph postcards, yes, the shaker ones, if you find the right ones, they're very valuable. And I found a collector, and I honestly, they were, like 1000 or $2,000 I sold them for they were shaker, like stereograph cards, like shaker, the religion, yeah, the images were shaker, and it's very collectible. And they were rare, like the guy who collects them had never seen them, so I didn't post those in the group. Because I didn't, I was like, I didn't buy these. I didn't find these, these for my parents. So I, you know, some of those, like, really large sales of my parents, I never shared
Suzanne Wells:because that's okay, because it's still something that's sold. Those what sold? Threads, yeah, are about sharing what sold, regardless of where you got it, and just so other people can be educated like, Oh, I've got one of those in my attic. Or a lot of times somebody will see it shortly after hearing about it, or seeing it on the group, it just pops into their experience. Like, I just heard about this. That happens all the time, so don't hold back sharing it, the fact that you did the work, you photographed the item, you put it up for sale, you shipped it, that all counts. I'm a little worried.
Unknown:I probably shouldn't say it's on the air. I'm a little worried the antique dental set was i Yeah, so my mom had two beautiful, like antique dental tool sets. My My grandfather was um, he collected them, and for whatever reason, or they were my great, great grandfather, and they got, we didn't, somehow we never got passed down the the tool set. My mom always wanted these. So I think when she found them in the wild, when she was a collector, she bought them. And, you know, of course, these were in our house, and I was researching them. I'm like, Are these bone what are these made out of? And I found a lovely man who bought one set. But I I ran into another collector who was not nice, and unfortunately, he bought one set, and he tried to buy the second one. He was trying to, you know, wiggle on the price, and he knew what they were. And anyway, so one lovely guy, one not so nice buyer. But I honestly, to this day, I still think they were put in jail. I don't know, really, no, I don't know. I don't know for sure if they were or not. I they look like bone. Some were made with Shell. I think, yeah, this was years ago. But the funny thing about ivory is, anybody who's selling it, it's it's antique. It's not anything new. We're not running out like, you know, right?
Suzanne Wells:Like they didn't go kill an elephant last
Unknown:week to get that.
Suzanne Wells:It's been there. But I think it falls under some kind of governmental rule that you can't sell these products from endangered animals at all, regardless of how old they are.
Unknown:You know, I don't know if the collector knew. I still don't know, because I identified it to the best that I could, and I thought it was shell or some other kind of bone. And I, in retrospect, as I research more, I'm like, okay, was that ivory? I don't know. I have no idea.
Suzanne Wells:Yeah, that's a tricky area, and one that I would not even venture into, because I wouldn't want it to be kicked out. You know, eBay has trigger words that if you have them in your listing, it gets examined further, and your listing can be taken down. And, yeah, that happened in 2020, the the bad word was two ply, because that was describing toilet paper that people were price gouging on. Well, I had some two ply cashmere sweaters, and those listings got pulled because they had the word to ply in them. And I don't do that anymore. I don't use that word anymore. I just take a picture of the label that says it's two ply so it's in a photo, and the search engine can't read photos. It can only read text. So stuff like that happens all the time, and I just I avoid any of those situations. And because I hear from people every week, oh, my store got shut down because of this, and they were warned, and they knew maybe they were using photos from a manufacturer's website, you know, which is theft. You don't take your own photos. And they're just like, Oh, I'm just going to risk it. I don't really care. It's okay. But no, it's not okay. If you want to make money on eBay, you got to have your account. So anyway, long story. What is it? It's ivory, and what are some other things that are prohibited?
Unknown:Oh, I think turtle, tortoise, the tortoise shell.
Suzanne Wells:Yeah, I've seen shark teeth, things. I don't think that's a problem, but there are certain animal products be wearing.
Unknown:And I had in my jewelry store, I had a little cellulite carved rose. And I don't know how it was listed, but there were other people had the same brooch, and they kept on taking mine down. And I'm like, This is not ivory. It says cellulite, but I think I use the word carved in it or something. You know, they would not, for the life of me, would not let it be and I think even then, it may have even been AI, because I just could not get past this. I had to call eBay, and I'm like, There's 20 other listings online with this brooch. It's just not like an endangered animals. Is plastic. So, okay, how many things are listed? Do you still have a store? I do still have a store. I have 300 items about listed. I have about 100 items here to list, which I'm going to focus on after my taxes. That's my next, next priority. I thought,
Suzanne Wells:I know April gives me a stomach ache.
Unknown:I was hoping to get them done by now, and that's kind of fallen short. So I That's my focus once that I'm sort of back to eBay full time and also still proceeding to look for, you know, part time or full time work, whatever feels you don't
Suzanne Wells:really have to source anything. You have all this stuff left from your parents, and you've got things coming to you by referral.
Unknown:Well, I had referral anymore because I haven't really focused on that, but I have jewelry that I bought last year that I just didn't list yet. So when the fall comes by, you know, when we hit fall, that's when a lot of the like church sales are and some of the annual sales I go to, so I didn't really buy anything like the first half of the year, but once fall hit, I had like, you know, five or six different sales that I went to. So still have jewelry from then I haven't listed that. So you've got a good stockpile. I have a decent stockpile, plus the scarves. And that's one of the hard things about Yes, you do well with those, yeah, but I don't have a house anymore, so before it's one of the I have a one bedroom apartment. So going from a house to one bedroom apartment, we had, my mom had, we used to, she used to hang up everything to dry. I grew up that way. I just like that. So it was lovely to wash scarves, because I could hand wash the scarves. And we had, like, five, like, you know, span this our garage like clothing lines to draw the scarves on. Well, I don't have any ability to really wash and scarf scenery. It's just not room, maybe my bathtub. So I don't the scarves are in boxes. I just, I'll get to that.
Suzanne Wells:It's you had some good scores, though, $200 or more for I'm trying to remember, was it Chanel, or what
Unknown:was the brand? I have sold a lot. Ralph some. Ralph Lauren does really well, if it's collectible. Chanel Hermes, yeah, I have some amazing designer scarves I have not listed. And I know people would be shocked when I listened to the podcast going, she's got items that are worth money she hasn't even listed. Like, I know people kind of are like, because it's not a thing, yeah, it's not even that. One of the things I thought is we left our parents house, or we sold the home, is that I thought I might get a first dibs account. It's hard. If you don't have a brick and mortar store, you have to have a certain following, a presence to apply. I think they do allow Non, non store people to have an account, but you have to have a certain following and all of that. But I have my mom's vintage Lily Pulitzer dresses, and I have some really high end pieces that I just I can't put them on eBay, but I thought, okay, and I know first dibs. Not everybody pays full price, and we know the whole first dibs effect, but I have two really. I have some beautiful scarves, but I have two key pieces. One was like a vintage handbag, which is really one of a kind. There's not that many left. And my sister found the be all end all of scarves for me a couple years ago. And it's, I don't know if you're familiar with the guy who used to wrap the bridges, Christos. He used to wrap them in fabric. It was him and his wife. Oh, no, we're not. So they did a project. It took 30 years to get it done in New York City, called the gates. It was, I think, in the 90s they had all he, literally, he worked with the New York, you know, Commissioner and to have this event happen, because these were orange fabric gates that ran. Through all of Central Park, and you could walk through them. And this was, he was, he was very well known. Him and his wife had both passed away, but this was a huge project to get done, and it was fabulous. I mean, my parents went to it. I was in California. I think I don't know where I was, but I wasn't where I was at the time, but I never went to it. But the Met did a scarf version of these. And one sold for $2,500 I've only seen like, three of them. I don't know if they were, like, really, really limited edition, or people have held on to them. So I have the gate scarf. It's a mint condition. So I'm like, I can list it on eBay. Might take a while to sell somebody. I oddly sold it for $50 but there's two sale on worth point $2,550 Oh, gosh. Okay, so somebody didn't know the value, yeah, so I would like a sometimes a little bit higher on venue, but it may be at some point I just put them all on eBay. My mom. Go back to your
Suzanne Wells:comment about moving from a house to an apartment, because in this day and age, there's so much information on how to live in a small space and all the storage options. And because this is I'm on track for that, I'm I'm on track for simplifying my life, living on less and just it's just less stress. So I watch apartment therapy. I don't know if you watch that channel, but it it's like my 200 square foot apartment in New York and all the things they do for storage, and even though you don't have a whole lot of inventory, but just something to consider. But the two rules are, whatever you put in your space, make it multi functional. So that ottoman, you know, the lid comes off, you can store stuff in there and it just everything you do is like that, and minimize your possessions. Like, do I really need this? And there's some great ideas on that apartment therapy site. I watched that at night when I have insomnia, YouTube, Netflix. It's YouTube, and it's called apartment therapy. And it's just interesting ways people set up their space when it's limited space like this. One lady was very into shoes. She just had a lot of shoes, and she never really cooked. She just made sandwiches or went out to eat at the diner right next to where she lived. And so she used her kitchen cabinets to store her shoes. You know, it's wherever you can put it. Or these people that live in RVs, and of course, they're outfitted with, yeah, storage things. But then they also have their creative ideas. So I watch that kind of stuff a lot because with inventory, I don't want it all over the place. I want it tucked away. I know where it is, but walking in, it's not so overwhelming to see everything everywhere, and I call it clutter, but it's draining. It's, it's emotionally draining to have too much clutter and you're looking at it, you're thinking about it, and when things are put away, it's, it's clear, and your mind is clear, and that kind of thing. So I know you're you're smart enough figure out going from a house to an apartment. But for the listeners, check those out apartment therapy. And just because it's great ideas for storing inventory.
Unknown:Yeah, no, it is. I have my jewelry here on site, so I have a walk. I actually got a walk in closet, which is nice, but I have a closet within a closet. So there's a smaller closet, which I don't know people would put you stuff in, but I have that as my jewelry. So all my jewelry is in there, with my scarves, but I have a storage unit for the stuff from my house that's still mine that I don't have room for in here, like all my books and and then my parents stuff. I still have paintings, I still have inventory from their store. So it's like whatever, seven by 10 by five. I mean, it's a standard unit. It's nothing massive. It's just normal size, right? But I go to visit that, I'll go at strange hours. Something sold. I have to run two towns over to pick up the item, come back to pack it. It doesn't make a lot of sense.
Suzanne Wells:Yeah, that's my concern, too, with storing anything off site. I've never done that in my whole eBay career. It's I just like having it with me, especially if it's just a question, and you can quickly pull the item and answer them. It's true. And I know up there, you know, you've you have bad weather and snow and sleet and, Oh, I gotta get out on that and go get this item. And I don't really have that problem down here, but I just, I guess it's like a control freak thing, but just, I want everything right here with me so I can access it very quickly. No people. People do
Unknown:ask questions. I had somebody the other day, and my parents. I call it my mom's store, and it was actually the stereograph cards, but they're ones I had of Switzerland, and I had photographed them, but not close enough that they could see the numbers. And they're like, Well, I collect these. Can you tell me what numbers are on those? And I'm looking at the photos, I can't even tell. So I ran all the way to storage. I got them. They're really faint. I'm like, writing in a message to the person, he didn't end up responding or buying them, but at least I know, and I do need to update the listing, so it was kind of like, okay, that listing needs some work there.
Suzanne Wells:Clearly, well, we're getting to the end here, and you're the perfect example of somebody who has a passion for reselling. And life just happened, and you had to step away for a while, because you can only do so much. And when life happens and it weighs on you mentally and emotionally and physically, something has to get put aside. So you did that, and you came back, and you're working through everything, and I just want to commend you on that being resilient and also being an example in the group when you start posting again,
Unknown:I have been here and there, yeah, and thank you. You're You're a prime example of resiliency. And I you know for everything, we're all
Suzanne Wells:in this together, so let's just support each other. And one thing I like to put out there is when you when you need to buy something, go on eBay first and support the community. And if we all do that, we all win.
Unknown:Yeah, I do. I buy postcards. I bought some postcards the other day. So, oh, good. Okay, so what are you up to this
Suzanne Wells:afternoon? Um,
Unknown:well, I need to, I'm going to run out and get some food. Have the whole no hot water issue going on, as I mentioned, whatever's going on with the building right now? Yeah, I just need to tackle some things. And it's, it's 70 today. So we've, been all over with temperatures, so I want to get out and walk and go to the beach and just, oh, you're near the beach. Good for you. Well, I'm right in the water. I go to near Sherwood Island, which is a state park, and I do have a whole walk I do there, or I walk around the neighborhood. I'm right by the water here. I live in a very beautiful setting, so it's really beautiful to walk even along here. But for longer, that is
Suzanne Wells:so good for your mental and emotional health to get out in nature and the sun. And just let's see, it's already 79 here and it's noon. Oh, wow.
Unknown:Well, you've had beautiful weather.
Suzanne Wells:Yeah, yeah. Maybe I'll get out and walk down to the lake and take a look at that too. So thanks for the encouragement. So anyway, thanks for coming on again.
Unknown:Thanks for having me again. And I hope I know we kind of span so many different topics. But you know people, if anybody in the group is listening, you can always reach out to me for any jewelry questions or anything too. I know people have in the past, they've sent me direct messages. So people in the group that have way more experience and have sold more jewelry as well. So I'm just one of many in the group that that sell jewelry too, but it's, you know, it's a community effort,
Suzanne Wells:and it's fun to help other people. I love being able to give somebody the answer in two seconds. And, you know, I've been researching this, I can't figure it out, and, oh, I know what that is. And it's, it's very fulfilling to know that your knowledge is helping somebody else. So thank you for sharing that. Okay, we'll have a good walk, and we will look for you on the group.
Unknown:Okay, thanks bye, bye.
Suzanne Wells:Thank you, Wendy, for sharing your knowledge. You are quite the entrepreneur. Okay, now for my big announcement, you i Wendy and I talked about snail mail clubs, and I could not love this idea more. So I have created my own mail club. The best way to get the details is to watch the video about it on my YouTube channel. I explain all the details about how it works and show you some examples of the goodies you will get, and tell you how to find it. You can also Google Suzanne's Happy Mail club, and you'll see the YouTube video right there at the top. I can't wait to send some happy mail to you next week. My guest is Donna, who has seen wild success selling vintage video games and pop culture collectibles. You may have seen her posts on the Facebook group, so we will hear from her in person next week. Thank you all for supporting this podcast and make it a happy week on eBay. Bye, everybody. You. You.