selling books on Amazon - tips for more profit

apprentice_tycoon

I have just remembered one more money saver with this - when you sell a book Amazon will email you with the details, you need to print this out as it has a packing slip with the purchase details on for you to enclose with the book plus an address label. This amounts to 3 sheets of paper, only the middle one is needed for the parcel, the rest is just info for you. Being an allround skinflint I use paper that has already been printed on for the number 1 and number 3 sheets and the one for the parcel gets a new sheet of paper. There is no saving on ink but there is on paper

Murray

Brilliant thread AT - I cant wait to finish work so that I can go and count up my old text books! You've put alot of work into the thread and explained things very clearly so I've nominated you too. Thanks! :T

cormicanshack

juliaw wrote:

No need to buy bubble wrap. When you shop at supermarkets collect the bubble wrap around the fruit. At first I used to ask the staff if I could have it, but they all looked at me as if I was mad. So now I just put it in the trolley, and use it for packing up the shopping.

Keep all your receipts for stationery, postage, new books bought, etc. You might be queried by the Inand Revenue.

Yes - I also use Sainsbury's banana packaging bubble wrap to supplement my bought roll - but would have to do an awful lot of frequent shopping to get sufficient for all the parcels - BC

Rave

apprentice_tycoon wrote:

I have just remembered one more money saver with this - when you sell a book Amazon will email you with the details, you need to print this out as it has a packing slip with the purchase details on for you to enclose with the book plus an address label. This amounts to 3 sheets of paper, only the middle one is needed for the parcel, the rest is just info for you. Being an allround skinflint I use paper that has already been printed on for the number 1 and number 3 sheets and the one for the parcel gets a new sheet of paper. There is no saving on ink but there is on paper

I have never bothered with this, I just write the address on the envelope and don't include a packing slip, and I've always had five star feedback.

O.K., I might as well share my killer tip. Buying books from charity shops/ boot fairs etc. to resell can be profitable, but you take the risk that you might not get your money back. If you can get them for free that risk is eliminated, and your sales generate pure profit. So how is this possible? Thanks to charity shop bins! Charity shops seem to get a lot of donations, and they need to turn over stock regularly to keep their range fresh, so they often chuck away unsold books if they've been on the shelves for (say) a month without selling. I have taken literally hundreds if not thousands of books from the bins of my local charity shop, and have sold books on Amazon from several different shops, so it's not like I just found the one lucky shop. Nowadays I tend to sort through the books at the bins and chuck back all the novels, Readers Digest condensed books etc. which don't sell well, and just take the ones (like textbooks, reference works etc.) that look like they might be worth a bit. Usually the books are thrown away in sealed bin bags and they're usually none the worse for the experience. Bin raiding might sound unappealing but I'm a hygiene freak and I can still bring myself to do it, I almost never get icky stuff on my hands and when I do the rewards are still worth it. Apart from the money to be made, I often find lovely books to keep for myself or my wife (a hardback copy of Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book was a recent one), and it's satisfying to rescue stuff that would otherwise go to landfill. Since all the book has cost me is time and effort I often list them a fair bit cheaper than other sellers which means that the buyers get a bargain too- so everyone wins.

apprentice_tycoon

Well, well well - there's a thought! would it work if you moved the time scale back a little and ask if you could have the books BEFORE they get to the bins, have you tried this?

Rave

To be honest, no I haven't. Taking them from the bin is so easy I've never felt the need, and I'm rarely around when they're open anyway. However if you were to volunteer in the shop I see no reason why they wouldn't give you first refusal on stuff that would otherwise be chucked. Alternatively, you could ask the shop to keep the books for you on the understanding that you share any profits from Amazon sales with them. Some shops (like Oxfam, as previously mentioned) do sell valuable items on ebay so it's presumably just ignorance or a simple lack of time that stops other charity shops doing the same.

Of course, it's not just books that I find, I've had lots of crockery, clothes, electrical items, suitcases etc. but by and large I leave that sort of stuff now as we have plenty....although I'm still partial to collecting kitsch ephemera, items that have some nostalgia value to me etc. It's a rewarding hobby:).

pdrg

For all those books you can't sell but deserve to be in circulation, try giving them away!!
http://www.bookcrossing.com/

This is such a lovely idea (not moneysaving per. se., unless you pick up a book somebody has left that you enjoyed reading for free ;-) )

Rave

I like the idea of bookcrossing, except the bit that states you're actually supposed to read the book first. I'm not really much of a reader. I'd happily be leaving dozens of books scattered far and wide otherwise.....

longplay

Hi all, my name's Lee and I run https://www.listbooks.co.uk which was mentioned earlier. I've noticed a few queries and what-not in this thread and I thought I'd wade in and try and answer some.

List Books is completely free for you to list items, I take no commission and charge no monthly fee. It's basically done because I have books to sell too and eBay and Amazon wanted too much for me to list them.

A question of postage came up early on. The postage is what you want to add to cover the whole shebang, it's limited to a selection of 2nd class and small parcel rates (listed by weight) and you need to add on some extra to cover envelopes/packing (bump it up to the next weight class).

Another reason I started List Books was because I did use Green Metropolis, but the problem for both buyers and sellers is they only list the oldest listed copy of a book. That means, if the book isn't popular, or there's a poor quality copy listed, you may never have your book appear on the site, and as a buyer it means your either stuck buying a bad quality book, or none at all. I didn't like that, so List Books lists all the copies of any book (and they show up immediately) and people can choose based on the condition, the price or the feedback a user has, much fairer I thought.

As for those of you with text books, I would like to point out another site who's owner I know in passing and who specialises in uni books, check out eunibooks.co.uk

Anyway, any other questions, feel free to drop me a line.

Lee

beachbeth

apprentice_tycoon wrote:

I have just remembered one more money saver with this - when you sell a book Amazon will email you with the details, you need to print this out as it has a packing slip with the purchase details on for you to enclose with the book plus an address label. This amounts to 3 sheets of paper, only the middle one is needed for the parcel, the rest is just info for you. Being an allround skinflint I use paper that has already been printed on for the number 1 and number 3 sheets and the one for the parcel gets a new sheet of paper. There is no saving on ink but there is on paper

You don't need to do that! Just open up Word (or Notepad) on your computer and then copy the relevant details from the email and paste them into Word to print out. That way you are only printing what you need.