How do you de-stash on-line?
This is a very simple concept. You take a picture, upload it directly to the app of choice, post a price and description, then hit the send button. Wait and see.
Where do you de-stash?
There are many outlets to do this at this point. (Apps – Letgo, Offerup, Poshmark, etc) But my favorite is Facebook. All of these outlets run a little differently, some take a percentage while others are free. Each have their own rules, here are a few.
Facebook group are notorious for being the Gestapo. They are run people by everyday people volunteering their time and frankly, most of them are bored and have nothing better to do then to act like a watchdog. (Can you tell I have a little disdain for these people?) My point here is to say that you need to mind the rules. Every page has a set of rules that you need to follow. For example, you may only post 1 item per day, you may only post in an album, you must delete you post after X number of months. There are reasons for rules, don’t be overwhelmed by them, once you get started you will get used to it. Oh, what happens if you break the rules? You get banned. Been there done that. Yup.
The groups like to dictate how you exchange money. For the most part they want you to do the transaction through Paypal. You don’t have an account, just get one. This is where you will have fees.
To find these groups, just do a search in the FB search bar and plug in something like “stamping destash” or jewelry tool destash/garage sale. Words like destash, garage sale, buy, sell, or trade are all good.
I (almost) never post on the Facebook marketplace because it seems to bring out all kinds of stupid from the internet. Though I know people who have had a lot of success there, at least they claim to.
Letgo is an app for your smart phone (I have never used on my desktop). I use this for larger items, things I would put on a garage sale. I have never tried to post any of my studio stuff there. I have had some success there. I figured why not? It is quite easy, take a picture of the item on your phone and post. And if I sell it, good for me. If not, it only took about 2 minutes to post. The post will remain there for about 28 days before they expire. You can renew at the time.
Poshmark is an app targeted to women selling mostly apparel. I am new to this app but understand that it is more like social media. There a lot of tactics on how to sell there, but I don’t have time for that. I am treating it much like Letgo and seeing what comes of it. You may want to Google “poshmark strategies” there are plenty of other people blogging on it.
*Porch pick-up – literally, people leave a box on their porch contain the item being sold with a box inside for the buyer to leave on the inside. I would not recommend this if you live in a big city but this is common practice in the area where we live. You can also just agree to be there to exchange the goods. However, not everyone is comfortable with strangers coming to the house.
For me this has worked out well through about 30 transactions in the past 3 years. There was only once where this person tried to negotiate me down upon arrival. That would be no, and no. I like the prices to be agreed to at the time of commitment.
*Meet up – arrange for a mutual public place to meet up and exchange the goods. If you are more comfortable bring a friend. This has also worked out well for me. Because most of the time the items are well below market value I am not willing to drive out of my way for a meet up. So when they want to meet up I make it convenient for me. Lately I have them meet me in front of the gym and because my gyms are approximately the distance apart from home I just have them choose one and I tie it into a work out and running errands.
*Shipping – For us shipping is easy as our business is already set up for it. However, if you are not set up for shipping you may want to do a little research to make it worth your time. Mostly things sold on destash pages on Facebook will need to be shipped. Almost always, I charge the buyer for shipping.
A Strategy
Yes, there is a strategy to all of this. First of all, things that sell wellare things that are scarce on sale, like Fretz hammers.
For Facebook, choose groups that are focused on the goods you are trying to sell. If you have PMC tools, look for a PMC de-stash group. There are groups for almost everything, leather working, nail art, metal stamping, jewelry tools, etc…By going to a targeted group there will be more people who are interested in the item you are selling and it will likely sell more quickly.
Bundle things together. This can work for you and it may work against you, it all in the how you bundle things. You don’t want to put a bundle of a hammer, beads and wire. You do want to bundle a hammer, a bench block and maybe a mandrel. I do like to list like items (category) together however, I always post individual prices then offer a discount if they take everything, perhaps free shipping or a percentage off. This way you have some opportunity rather than none. At least that is my theory and it has worked well.
Be honest about your goods. If they are used, how used are they? People appreciate this information. And believe it or not, if you do good by them, they will buy from you again. I have had many people who follow me because they know that the things I sell are not crap which help the items sell faster.
Pricing should be discounted from retail. Depending how used it is, determines my discount. If I only used it once, it is only 20%. If more it is anywhere between 30-50% off. For things that you are selling locally like your patio set, be prepared for bargaining. I price things prepared to discount it if asked and when they don’t, bonus! Keep in mind that most people will ask for a discount, most will accept the answer of NO. I have only had one interested buyer decline my decline. I do not discount much on local items. Mostly because I am selling at 70% off, so no. Be sure that you are accounting for the fees from Paypal or from the app. But this may not matter to you.
Organization
Keep a spreadsheet of your items and all the places you have posted it so that you can keep them updated. What do I mean by this? Often I will post on multiple pages, more eyes, more customers, better chances of selling. If I don’t keep track of where I have posted, then it will remain as an open item and someone else may want to buy it after you have already sold it on another page. Once an item has sold I will go to all the pages and mark them sold or delete the post.
Create some sort of system for yourself. Here is mine. I have a spreadsheet with all of my items, the price, the quantity, the page to which I have posted, and to whom I have sold it. Once the item has been committed to, I send them an invoice; when I have been paid, I immediately print the invoice and mark the item sold. I will not mark something sold until I have received monies. It is just a personal policy. I feel like I am jinxing it.
Just a few more things to remember:
*Don’t forget to state your shipping method, USPS, UPS, pick up only, whatever.
*Respond as quickly as you can when people are ask questions.
*If on Facebook, be sure to check your “message requests” box. Sometimes people will send a note there.
*”Like” people’s comments to acknowledge them. But when you respond to them, tag them in the response. This was a major fail on part.
*Good idea to state that you are Smoke Free and/or Pet Free household when you are selling household goods. People like to know this.
*Some lingo: NIL – next in line; ISO – in search of; Bump – this is a just a way for sellers to get their post back to the top of the list.
*Even though the app usually tells people your general location people don’t look. Note the your location in the post so people can anticipate how long it will take to get to them.
*People will state “interested” I don’t know what that means really, do you want it or not? Some groups say that this will put them in line while they think about it. I say the first person to say “I’ll take it” wins.
That is about all I know, good luck selling!