Nine Expensive Mistakes To Avoid In Your eBay Reselling Business

Celebrating your wins on your reselling journey is one of the best parts of the process. Had a record sales day? You’re on top of the world. Paid 99p for a super valuable item? Pure excitement. Hit your listing goals for the week? Crack open a bottle of wine.

But for every Instagram worthy success that you have, there are the mistakes along the way that cost you time and money and frustration. I know because I’ve made them plenty of times myself, and I’ll no doubt make plenty more as I work on growing my sales each month. 

Sometimes they’re your best learning experiences, but some of them can be avoided all together. Forewarned is forearmed, and all of that. Here are nine expensive mistakes to steer clear of in your eBay reselling business…

1. MISCALCULATING POSTAGE COSTS

Every reseller I know has a tale about when they were left out of pocket because they miscalculated their postage costs. Mine involves a chunky vintage jumper that I picked up for 99p, and sold a few days later for £20. All good so far. But I’d also decided to offer free postage on that item – something that I never usually do. Assuming it went via Royal Mail as a small parcel for £2.90, that would have been around £14 profit after fees. I rocked up at the Post Office though, and discovered it was a bit TOO chunky. It weighed over 2kg, so I ended up paying about £15 to send it, leaving me with maybe a quid or two profit.

Yes, I could have sent it via Hermes for less. But I was already in the Post Office at this point, miles away from any drop off points, so I decided to just pay the price and take it as a lesson.

The silly thing about this mistake is that it’s easily avoided. All the main postal services have detailed information on their websites on how much you’ll pay to send your item, based on size and weight. If in doubt, check before you list to avoid a nasty surprise. Remember too that eBay charge a fee on the postage cost that you’ve collected from your buyers, so you also need to factor that into your calculations.

2. RELYING SOLELY ON YOUTUBE & INSTAGRAM FOR SOURCING INSPIRATION

There’s a ton of reselling YouTubers and Instagrammers who very generously give up their time to share hints and tips and advice about what to pick up to resell when you’re out sourcing. I’ve learned absolutely loads from checking out their content, and this helped so much especially in the early days when I wandered into charity shops with no real idea of what to look out for.

If that’s the extent of your inspiration though, you’re very quickly going to find that you’ll struggle. Instead, get obsessed with doing your own research and checking out completed listings for items and brands that you see out and about. Look up the labels you’ve never heard of. Look beyond the labels altogether and start getting a feel for styles that sell regardless of where they were initially bought. If I find a plus size item of ladies clothing, for example, that’s good quality and particularly loud or ugly or in your face, and it’s also a good price, then I’ll usually pick it up, regardless of the brand.

I’ve got no doubt that I must walk right past ridiculously profitable items in charity shops each and every week, just because I don’t realise that they’re good finds. There’s no shortage of stuff to sell, is what I’m saying. The eBay app puts all the market information you need right in your hand. It’s just a case of being curious, and applying a good dose of trial and error.

3. GETTING LAZY WITH RESEARCH

Just because something was selling like hotcakes a couple of months ago, it doesn’t mean that there’s still a demand right now. And just because a particular brand’s boots sell for a small fortune, it doesn’t necessarily mean that their jackets are worth sourcing. You’ll often even find that there’s a huge difference between the value of two otherwise identical items depending on their size.

Once you get some experience under your belt, you learn what to look out for and you can often walk into a charity shop and make some good sourcing decisions without having to check your phone for completed listings. Still though, the information is quite literally at your fingertips, and it’s a good idea to stay in the habit of checking in with the app and not just getting too comfortable with what you think you know.

4. LOSING TRACK OF EARNINGS AND EXPENSES

It’s surprisingly easy to get to the end of the month and basically have no idea how much profit you’ve made. You forget about those lunch time charity shop trips where you spent a few quid here and there, and you underestimate your outgoings. Then you’ve got postage and packaging costs to consider, as well as eBay and PayPal fees, and all of a sudden, what seemed like a simple calculation has turned into a right old mess.

After my first month of reselling, I realised that I needed a system. Keeping track of your numbers is ESSENTIAL, and to do that, you’re going to have to get organised.

You can get all kinds of fancy software to do this for you, but my approach is pretty simple. I track all costs, including stock and postage, in a little notebook that I update at the end of each day. Then at the end of the month, I enter everything into a straightforward spreadsheet, and calculate my final profit. Once a year, I visit an accountant, hand over all my documents, and he sorts out my tax return for me. That gives me a massive amount of peace of mind, and it’s well worth the investment.

5. ACCIDENTALLY SOURCING STOCK WITH RIPS OR TEARS

Seriously, this is one of THE most frustrating mistakes that I’ve made in my reselling business. I’d love to say that I’ve only done it once, but that would be a lie. You find a great little bargain when you’re out sourcing, and you’re excited to get it listed. Then you get home and you realise that there’s A HUGE BLOODY RIP RIGHT THROUGH THE LINING. Or a nasty stain on the sleeve. Or it’s missing a really distinctive button that you wouldn’t be able to replace. So what you initially thought was a good buy, was a complete waste of money.

Sometimes you can fix the problem, but it’s still going to take up more of your time than you expected. These days, I always try to give my finds a quick but thorough inspection before I take them to the till. I’ll check the pockets, the lining, the zips and buttons, and I’ll give them a once-over for little holes, tears, or marks. It takes 20 seconds, and has saved me from a fair few dud purchases.

Of course, some issues are fixable. Check out this post about getting summer stains out of clothing, from Queen of Clean.

6. GETTING TOO COMFORTABLE WITH ONE SOURCING GOLDMINE

Maybe you’ve got a local charity shop with a 99p rail that’s always crammed with designer dresses that you can easily sell for a hundred quid. Okay, that might be unlikely, but bear with me. You’re picking up a handful of dresses each week without any hassle, and you’re making a full time income each week for a few hours of work. THE DREAM! Then the charity shop closes down and that income source disappears entirely. That might be fine if you’re reselling as a side hustle and you’re not too fussed about doing it long term, but if you want to turn reselling into a sustainable and long lasting business, relying on one source of stock isn’t wise.

When it comes to sourcing, anything can happen. Your favourite charity shops might change their pricing policies, leaving no room for you to profit. Most boot sales are only open during the summer months. Wholesalers can be hit and miss.

I know that I don’t want to find myself in a position whereby I’m too reliant on any particular source of stock, so I work on trialling and testing different options. I take full advantage of the good ones when things are going well, but I try to keep in mind that nothing lasts forever, and that I don’t want all my eggs in one basket.

7. LETTING YOUR HOUSE DESCEND INTO TOTAL CHAOS

This is one that I’m always trying to avoid, but there are plenty of days when my house looks like there’s been an explosion in a clothing factory. It’s almost inevitable when you’ve been out sourcing then you need to wash and iron and measure and sort before anything can be put away into storage. There’s a fine line though between necessary mess, and things getting to the stage where you have no idea what’s going on, and you can’t find that item you’ve just sold.

This is another thing that I quickly realised I needed a system for. Stuffing things into bags and then shoving them in a corner wasn’t going to cut it anymore. So now, I’ve got my own little workflow that I’ve created to make sure that stuff gets organised and listed and shipped in something that at least resembles an orderly fashion.

You don’t need a massively complicated system when you’re getting started, and things will evolve and grow with your business, but taking a little time to plan how you’ll manage your stock will save you a ton of stress and hassle.

8. STARTING HIGH-VALUE ITEMS ON 99P AUCTIONS

This is probably a bit controversial in the reseller community. Plenty of people do well with auctions… But I’ve trialled, I’ve tested, I’ve used different strategies, and I’ve realised that Buy It Now works much better for my reselling business. This way, you state the full price that you want for the item, and you wait for the buyer to come along.

There’s the argument that starting an auction at 99p will get it a ton of attention in the first couple of days, and really drive the price up. When you do that though, it’s a very realistic possibility that you’ll get just one bidder, and you’ll have to let that item go for less than a quid. Obviously it’s going to depend on the item in question and how much demand there is for it right now, but my advice on this one is to exercise a good dose of caution. If you want to make sure that you bag a decent profit, you need to start the auction at the minimum price that you’d be willing to sell that item for. 

My attempts at auctions have created lacklustre results, and though I’ll probably dip into experimenting with them again at some point in the future, I’m sticking with what I know works right now.

If you’re planning to run auctions, check out this guide to picking the best time to list your items from Clare at My Money Cottage.

9. BEATING YOURSELF UP OVER MISTAKES

No one starts an eBay reselling business then finds that everything just falls into place overnight and that there are never bumps in the road to contend with. At the end of a day, it’s a business. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it. I’ve made my fair share of mistakes on my reselling journey so far, and I’ve got no doubt that I’ll make plenty more. I’ll probably make mistakes that are glaringly obvious, mistakes that I haven’t even thought about yet, and I might even repeat a few of the old ones just for good measure.

It’s totally normal to feel a bit downcast when you bugger things up, but it really is just part of the process. Learn from it, consider how you can prevent it from happening again, and get back in the horse.

And remember too… For all the big sales that you see people talking about, and their record months, and their lofty 60-day totals… They’ve made just as many mistakes and had just as many fails on their journey. It’s just not as sexy to talk about that stuff.

Want to read more about running an eBay reselling business? Check out these posts: 

• Your Complete Guide To Buying Vintage Wholesale To Sell On eBay
• Why Reselling Clothes On eBay Is One Of My Favourite Ways To Make Money Online
• Four Reasons Why Your Stuff Isn’t Selling On eBay

SaveSave

SaveSaveSaveSave