why won't my wedding dress sell??

missy_moo_5

I'm getting a bit fed up. Just wondered if anyone else had any bright ideas.

I've listed my "old" wedding dress for sale on ebay 5 times running which is starting to mount up with listing fees. I've looked at previous threads about selling 2nd hand dresses and followed all the tips. I've photographed it on a lovely wooden manequin which I borrowed from a friends shop and added 2 "real life" photos of me in it. I've given acres of information on it, all the measurements I can list, the name of the designer, etc. It's a well known desired designer and the dress is pretty and nothing whacky.

I've thrown in freebies (the veil, storage box, etc) and offered for people to come and try it on. It is 5 years old, but the dress was still being made and sold as a current style until last year so I don't think I'm being unreasonable with a starting price of £185 when it cost £1,400 new. I've had loads and loads of page views (the last listing was over 80) and 6 watchers, but no one bids or contacts me. What am I doing wrong?

I've tried pre-loved too - not a squeak!

I've looked at the local paper, but advertising an item over £100 would cost about £30 and considering I only want such a small amount for it in the first place, it's eating into what I think is reasonable to expect for it.

Does anyone know of any other place I can try to sell it, which doesn't cost the earth to advertise on? I really need to shift it - I really seriously need the money and feel like getting married again in 8 weeks with my prior dress hanging around in the house isn't really what I want to do.

Anyone got any bright ideas?

Bride2be24

why dont you try selling it on here?? http://www.sellmyweddingdress.co.uk/

EDIT: second thoughts its £15 per item so i doubt it x

EDIT 2: try http://www.gumtree.com/for-sale

http://www.iwantthatweddingdress.com/Pages/Sell.aspx but its a one off fee of £10

Maysie

I think that many are watching it hoping it will get relisted cheaper. I was watching a dress from april to june waiting for it to come down when it did i bid and it ended higher than it did not sell for! And out of my budget lol. It went for double start price. If you look in unsold in my ebay how many are still watching the dress?

You might be missing those who are only looking at cheaper dresses. Once someone sees "their dress" and falls in love with it their budget might increase. Think about watching similar/same dress that start under £100 and under £150 nice round numbers. When i was searching i narrowed it down by excluding those over a certain amount. Do different sizes sell for different prices? Do they sell? How many bidders do they get and when do people bid? What time of day and what day of the week are you ending on? Is it worth paying for a subtitle so you can put originally cost x and maybe something about the detail that did not fit in the title?

kitschkitty

I think you might do better trying the for sale boards on some of the wedding forums like hitched and confetti. It's totally free - though I would always recommend getting to know the forum a little rather than doing a "post and run" as the sales boards on those forums are based on trust.

The other thing may be that you are actually selling the dress too cheaply so the people watching it are wondering if there is something wrong with it. It could actually be better to start with a slightly higher price and then say that you will consider all reasonable offers, so that people think they are getting a bargain, but don't question a low starting price.

missy_moo_5

Maysie wrote: »

I think that many are watching it hoping it will get relisted cheaper. I was watching a dress from april to june waiting for it to come down when it did i bid and it ended higher than it did not sell for! And out of my budget lol. It went for double start price. If you look in unsold in my ebay how many are still watching the dress?
QUOTE]

Maysie thank you. I've reduced it at every listing, starting at £300 and now down to £185. Between re-listings I had under watcher numbers "1" (didn't realise thats what it meant actually, that you can watch an item even though it's ended?) - thank you.

KitschKitty - I think maybe I will add a "make an offer" thing and edit the post to see. After all, if this one watcher is still watching maybe they will "approach" and at least we can get a dialogue going? BTW - are you kitschkitty of UKBeaders? Or is it just a coincidence with the name?

B2B24 - thanks hun, I didn't even twig about gumtree!! I'll do that this evening!!

Just a bit exasperated as I know if I could get someone through the door to try it on, they'd rip my hand off for that price!!

Maysie

Have you tried the old fashioned postcard in the supermarket?

sal-ad_daze

I second the lower starting price on ebay!
My dd bought a pair of Jimmy Choo's that started at 99p! They sold at £127! A similar pair with a starting price of £105 didn't sell at all!
she and her OH also sold a coffee machine (one of the big ones from cafes), the first listing started at something like £400 and they got nothing, relisted it (I actually think @ 99p) and it sold for £600!!
so I'd try it at a much lower start price but if you're worried put a reserve on it.
HTH

Horace

You could always have a Buy It Now on Ebay so that you can put your auction figure on there and a Buy It Now which could be say £150 or £100 or whatever that way someone might just go for it.

I think that some people don't like second hand dresses because they think that it is bad luck to wear a pre-loved dress (I think this is a load of tosh but some folks think like that).

LisaLou1982

Ive never sold a wedding dress on ebay but i do sell a lot of other things on there and have found from experience that starting my listings at 99p with no reserve usually ends up with the item going for more than if id have put a higher starting price

....people like to think theyre getting a bargain on an item starting at 99p and usually end up bidding more!

Good luck xx

fuzzybear01

I think that a lot of people now would rather pay the same amount of money for a knock-off copy of a designer dress. You only have to look at the sheer number of dresses available from Hong Kong.

bubbles0169

fuzzy i think you maybe a little right but now people are becoming more aware of how cheap the dresses really are, thay actually look cheap so are shying away from the china route

missy could you pui a link to it here so we could give you some more tips on how to list it plus id love to see it, cant get enough of dresses!