Once you are sure you can sell a lot of product X, why not skip the middleman and go straigth to the source the store bought it from?
[QUOTE=Maastricht]
Once you are sure you can sell a lot of product X, why not skip the middleman and go straigth to the source the store bought it from?
[/QUOTE]
Well, stores aren’t really willing to tell you who their suppliers are. Plus, chain stores get discounts for buying huge quantities of stuff all at once. I have neither the storage nor the cash flow to buy huge quantities at this point (I might get there in a couple of years; for now, I’ve been doing this about six months).
Mangetout, I’ve done a “Completed Listings” search, which is how I found out that the one item I’m thinking of trying sells for about double what the store charges, when it sells. But only sells about 50% of the time.
4.66, you make some excellent points. As a matter of fact, I was going to tell the employee what my plans are when checking the store’s return policy. I doubt if some drone behind the customer service desk would know the store’s policy on such an esoteric thing, but would probably call the manager over. If anyone gives me a hint that this would be contrary to the store’s policy, I either won’t buy questionable items, or I will buy them with the same attitude I buy everything else I re-sell: it’s a gamble. I’ll probably make some money, I may not make any money, I might possibly lose some money. Such is the nature of running a business.
[quote=bathsheba]
Take a digicam into the store and photograph the items. Put them on ebay then only buy what sells.
[quote]
Well, others have pointed out the obvious flaws in that plan. Thanks for the thought, though. 
[QUOTE=norinew]
Mangetout, I’ve done a “Completed Listings” search, which is how I found out that the one item I’m thinking of trying sells for about double what the store charges, when it sells. But only sells about 50% of the time.
[/QUOTE]
Which might mean that either:
-You need to price it a bit lower than that
-You need to relist it if unsold.
-Either of which could of course make it a non-profit venture, so yes, you could try to return it, but as I said, I don’t think the store will tolerate it as an ongoing thing.
Also… (if you haven’t already thought of this - I appreciate you’re an experienced seller so I might be teaching the sucking of eggs here) - dig a bit deeper - is there anything about the photographs or descriptions in the 50% of unsold items that is different from the 50% that did sell?