SELLING TYRES ON EBAY

Ian1961

caprikid1 said:

"It feels like an incredibly crowded market to me.  I plugged "tyres" in to ebay.co.uk and there are over 1.2 million listings.  Where there is a lot of competition on ebay it becomes a race to the bottom on price."

THat's ebay, race to the bottom on prices, no protection for sellers from rogue buyers. Not sure why anyone would use it as a platform to be honest if any alternatives exist. Facebook market place seems to be exploding.

I recently sold 4 wheels & tyres on ebay, didn't get a nibble on facebook after 2 months. Only gripe from me was the percentage for ebay.

motorguy

caprikid1 said:

"It feels like an incredibly crowded market to me.  I plugged "tyres" in to ebay.co.uk and there are over 1.2 million listings.  Where there is a lot of competition on ebay it becomes a race to the bottom on price."

THat's ebay, race to the bottom on prices, no protection for sellers from rogue buyers. Not sure why anyone would use it as a platform to be honest if any alternatives exist. Facebook market place seems to be exploding.

Agreed.  And among tyre dealers retailing them, you're up against private sellers selling what they happen to have sitting in their garage and just glad to get rid of it, so can and will sell them for less.

Its definitely not an ebay market i'd want to be trying to turn a profit in.

I just plugged in some rough figures to this ebay fees calculator.  Tyre sold at £33, bought for £25.  £10 postage added to the price at cost price.

Looks like an easy 32% profit but after ebay and paypal fees of £7.23 that drops to just 77p.  Out of that 77p you've to cater for returns, weasel customers and hassle. 

https://www.ebayfeescalculator.com/uk-ebay-calculator/

motorguy

Ian1961 said:

caprikid1 said:

"It feels like an incredibly crowded market to me.  I plugged "tyres" in to ebay.co.uk and there are over 1.2 million listings.  Where there is a lot of competition on ebay it becomes a race to the bottom on price."

THat's ebay, race to the bottom on prices, no protection for sellers from rogue buyers. Not sure why anyone would use it as a platform to be honest if any alternatives exist. Facebook market place seems to be exploding.

I recently sold 4 wheels & tyres on ebay, didn't get a nibble on facebook after 2 months. Only gripe from me was the percentage for ebay.

and you were probably able to undercut all the retail sellers as you were disposing of tyres for whatever you could get for them, not trying to turn a profit.

facade

motorguy said:

I just plugged in some rough figures to this ebay fees calculator.  Tyre sold at £33, bought for £25.  £10 postage added to the price at cost price.

Looks like an easy 32% profit but after ebay and paypal fees of £7.23 that drops to just 77p.  Out of that 77p you've to cater for returns, weasel customers and hassle. 

Don't you have to pay 20% VAT on the markup?- £12, so there is £2.40 VAT to pay, making a loss of £1.63

GrumpyDil

facade said:

motorguy said:

I just plugged in some rough figures to this ebay fees calculator.  Tyre sold at £33, bought for £25.  £10 postage added to the price at cost price.

Looks like an easy 32% profit but after ebay and paypal fees of £7.23 that drops to just 77p.  Out of that 77p you've to cater for returns, weasel customers and hassle. 

Don't you have to pay 20% VAT on the markup?- £12, so there is £2.40 VAT to pay, making a loss of £1.63

Wouldn't that only apply if you either choose to or meet the turnover requirement to have to register for VAT

facade

GrumpyDil said:

facade said:

motorguy said:

I just plugged in some rough figures to this ebay fees calculator.  Tyre sold at £33, bought for £25.  £10 postage added to the price at cost price.

Looks like an easy 32% profit but after ebay and paypal fees of £7.23 that drops to just 77p.  Out of that 77p you've to cater for returns, weasel customers and hassle. 

Don't you have to pay 20% VAT on the markup?- £12, so there is £2.40 VAT to pay, making a loss of £1.63

Wouldn't that only apply if you either choose to or meet the turnover requirement to have to register for VAT

The turnover threshold is £85k, if you want to make a living off the profit the turnover would have to be more than that.

GrumpyDil

facade said:

GrumpyDil said:

facade said:

motorguy said:

I just plugged in some rough figures to this ebay fees calculator.  Tyre sold at £33, bought for £25.  £10 postage added to the price at cost price.

Looks like an easy 32% profit but after ebay and paypal fees of £7.23 that drops to just 77p.  Out of that 77p you've to cater for returns, weasel customers and hassle. 

Don't you have to pay 20% VAT on the markup?- £12, so there is £2.40 VAT to pay, making a loss of £1.63

Wouldn't that only apply if you either choose to or meet the turnover requirement to have to register for VAT

The turnover threshold is £85k, if you want to make a living off the profit the turnover would have to be more than that.

Yes, but as a start up you wouldn't need to be VAT registered, albeit with the kind of profit margins that @motorguy suggests not something that looks even worth considering. 

Herzlos

Though if you're already selling tyres somewhere else (like a physical shop) it won't really hurt to expand to ebay.

motorguy

facade said:

motorguy said:

I just plugged in some rough figures to this ebay fees calculator.  Tyre sold at £33, bought for £25.  £10 postage added to the price at cost price.

Looks like an easy 32% profit but after ebay and paypal fees of £7.23 that drops to just 77p.  Out of that 77p you've to cater for returns, weasel customers and hassle. 

Don't you have to pay 20% VAT on the markup?- £12, so there is £2.40 VAT to pay, making a loss of £1.63

Indeed, yes, assuming their turnover is beyond the VAT threshold

motorguy

Herzlos said:

Though if you're already selling tyres somewhere else (like a physical shop) it won't really hurt to expand to ebay.

Where you only have a set amount of used tyres to resell, selling tyres at cost + a very small margin on ebay may be a lot worse than just selling them locally for better profit and getting a bit more profit on the fitting and balancing too.

Selling a container load of tyres locally, fitted and balanced for a decent profit is better than selling half a container load that way, and half at a waifer thin margin.

I guess the exception to that might be odd ball sizes for which there is a limited market for locally and are taking up space.