eBay : how to sell 2

Before delving into the technicalities of setting up a seller’saccount on eBay, let’s hear the first-hand findings of a new seller. Me!

As previously mentioned, yours truly combined some hands-on research into selling on eBay with a garage clearance. Having long paid homage tothe classic Saab 900 and accumulated a number of ‘handy bits’ over the course of 15 years, time was called on my big Swedish model. Corrosion had finally won the day.

Being Saab-less was bad enough, not having a car old enough to tinker on compounded the trauma. Salvation, it turned out, lay in a garage four miles away. Inside was a 1962 Series 2A Land Rover in need of major TLC. The past four years had been spent in storage, the two previous had seen the Land Rover sit at a road end acting as a mail box! The last MoT certificate was dated 1997: this was a ground up restoration job.

Naturally, I went back the next day and bought it from the owner. After towing USJ 933 home, a spare car battery was hooked up. Success, the ignition lights come on. I was well impressed. The Land Rover-towing chum suggested putting some petrol in the carb to see if the engine would turn over. And spin she did for the first time in at least eight years. But for the fact we couldn’t get a spark at the plugs, my 44 year old Land Rover would probably have started first turn of the key.

The point of this, hopefully interesting, diversion is that I desperately needed as much storage space as I could find for my new ‘project’, and vindication for squirreling away old Saab parts. It was time to liquidize my assets by selling them on eBay to meet some of the cost of doing up the Land Rover.

While this scenario is probably not analogous with many small to micro-sized businesses in the Highlands and Islands, the process of selling on eBay and the principles underlying are exactly the same. I had, in effect, old stock I needed to offload. Any price I could obtain for these parts was more than I would get by them gathering dust or dumping them in a skip.

First of all, I had to decide what I would sell, so a major sort out was called for. Parts that were generic and could be used on other vehicles I put to one side. Components that I wasn’t happy about selling as used spares were eliminated, i.e. anything involved in stopping or steering.

Next to be saved from exposure to sale were any parts that weighed more than 20 kg or were too bulky to post using Royal Mail parcel post, e.g. doors, the gearbox and engine etc. This was all starting to sound suspiciously like a hoarder’s charter, according to the wife.

What was left were parts that I knew from experience would come in handy for your average Saab owner. This I summed up neatly as:

* Anything plasticky that your dog likes to chew if he gets bored while waiting for you to return to the car
* Bits and pieces you don't fancy trudging round lots of muddy scrap yards looking for
* Parts you don't want to pay over the odds for from a dealer
* Spares that invariably come in sets when you only need one. Or that are only sold as part of an entire unit.
* Fiddly things you lose/trash and then don't know the name of but whose absence is a source of constant annoyance and irritation.

Eventually I had my ‘stock’ assembled. As a final filter, I checked each part individually and sifted out any parts I wasn’t 100 per cent certain were in serviceable condition. The test I employed was that if a part weren’t good enough to be fitted to my own Saab then I’d bin it. I'd far rather avoid the hassle than sell a bit I thought was going to cause me a load of grief. Life's really too short.

This stock-taking business didn’t happen overnight of course. All the time I was keeping a rolling monitor on the Saab category within eBay to get a handle on what was most in demand and the going rate for parts that I had to sell. To speed things up I saved a classic Saab 900 search in My eBay and any items of interest I’d watch to find out the final bid price. I also took a note of the starting price and the postage being charged to help build up a comprehensive overview.

It’s worth pointing out here to be sure you’re monitoring the most appropriate category. Be sure that other people are selling the some kind of items as you want to. In this instance, for example, there was little point searching auction items listed for Saab 900. My spare parts would only fit the pre-1994 Saab 900, the big barge with chunky-bumpers-you-can-sit-on variety, not the much less distinctive smoothed out GM-takeover version based on the Vauxhall Vectra.

The online research also proved useful in preparing a shortlist of items with which to test the water. It quickly became clear new parts sold very well as did walnut dashboard trim and anything vaguely related to the Saab 900 Turbo. Some items only sold if they were new, but there was still a healthy trade in used parts especially the slightly less run of the mill part not easily sourced elsewhere such as rear seat ashtrays and other bits and bobs that get lost, worn out or fall off. Having owned three Saab 900s, for a while simultaneously, I instinctively knew which bits and bobs these were.

Now all that remained was to dream up the item descriptions and take dozens of digital photographs of everything from reversing light switches and relays to body trim and door pins.