Free shipping on eBay. How?

stanislav · #1 05-15-2012

Can anyone give me some suggestion or tip on shipping? I see electronic items (headphones for example) sold for 5-10$, free shipping. I am just wondering how is it possible to offer free shipping if it will probably cost as much to ship, also don't forget listing price and eBay&PayPal fees. It's almost impossible. Anyone knows the secret to how some sellers are able to offer free shipping on such items? I heard CanadaPost has some business discount for businesses who send over 30 items a day but I don't know their rates. Maybe someone will enlighten me.

Thank you.

MM78 · #2 05-15-2012

Maybe Chinese sellers? I see a billion Chinese sellers sometimes selling items for $1.99 with free shipping, of course it takes 30 days to get to destination but I see it all the time. As for free shipping on super cheap items I don't know bro.

I don't see how there's any profit to be made really.

newjerseymax · #3 05-15-2012

Use flat rate shipping so you will know cost ahead of time and include that in your BIN price. With auctions a bit more difficult, then start price should at minimum cover shipping costs....

Example....

Say with product cost, fees and shipping is $6.38 Then your listing should be anything above that. If you cannot then you didnt get the best deal or they bought larger quantity.

newjerseymax · #4 05-15-2012

Also, Remember china sellers cost of shipping is a lot less then for us....l

If they sell 200x items a day ( a lot time more) then they make $162 profit which goes a lot further cause cost of living is much lower.

Then there are many ships stolen by pirats too that end up on ebay and get scattered as payment for some. Thats 100% profit

MM78 · #5 05-15-2012

Pirates you say....I think if we started a Pirate Ship we would not be good at it, lol.

rsot · #6 05-15-2012

When you are enlightened, feel free to enlighten me as well. All the best.

FizzyFish · #7 05-15-2012

Aye tis true - tis cheaper to ship from China to US that within the US. That is including tracking with USPS too...!

I read an interesting article that had some very good examples in it showing comparisons of shipping costs between domestic shipping in the US and International shipping from China to the US. I can't find it right now...but the figures were quite alarming (good for Chinese sellers, v.v.bad for US sellers)

USPS Deal with eBay Helps Expedite Chinese Imports

This has some info but it is not what I was looking for... I will see if I can find it again.

Found it

http://letters.auctionbytes.com/cgi-...334191984.html

rsot · #8 05-15-2012

marysman78 has a lot of nice colours in that image,

Thankful · #9 05-15-2012

Stan - Keep in mind that some sellers don't even sell for a profit with cheap items, break even/loss for DSRs so they look better as business when selling the more higher end products.

In the long run its better for them actually, buyers will be more confident buying the more expensive items of them due to the DSRs :D

rsot · #10 05-15-2012

Yes variation of products that don't generate much profit with big ticket items are how shipping costs can be offset.

stanislav · #11 05-15-2012

Thank you everyone for your advice!

stanislav · #12 05-15-2012

I think it is a good idea to sell cheap items to gain good feedbacks because after all if you have more than 20 seller feedbacks you wont have 21 day holds on your PayPal account.

Gamefreak · #13 05-16-2012

More than likely they have some type of partnetship with the shipping company for mailing more than 300k packages. Perfect example is Amazon with UPS.. Free 2 day shipping and overnight shipping on ANYTHING for 3.99! Impossible no?

MM78 · #14 05-16-2012

We might as well move to China and ship the items from there! No wonder people want to do drop-shipping.

rsot · #15 05-16-2012

marysman78 can be charge of setting up the Aspkin Compound/Complex

FizzyFish · #16 05-16-2012

Quote:

We might as well move to China and ship the items from there! No wonder people want to do drop-shipping.

Well you are all welcome here

There's plenty of space on my floor. You can help me stuff envelopes too

rsot · #17 05-16-2012

I'm down FizzyFish - hope your pay is decent

FizzyFish · #18 05-16-2012

Pay!?!?

Good one! Muahahaha

Thankful · #19 05-16-2012

In China they don't pay you, you work for them and pay them ha.

rsot · #20 05-16-2012

One emoticon sums it all up then :

FizzyFish · #21 05-16-2012

The times they are a changing though.

There are now more jobs than workers in China - workers can pick and choose.

I saw a programme on the telly that showed a worker asking for a 50% pay rise - and it was being seriously considered by the (English) boss. If you asked for a 50% pay rise ANYWHERE else in the world, once your boss had stopped laughing, you would get a boot up the arse and then shown the door.

In the last 10 years wages have increased by 500% (from 2 kuai an hour to 10)

China is no longer the cheapest labour force in the world!

Time to start checking out some other 3rd world/developing countries!!

Africa anyone?

Thankful · #22 05-16-2012

Quote:

Originally Posted by FizzyFish

The times they are a changing though.

There are now more jobs than workers in China - workers can pick and choose.

I saw a programme on the telly that showed a worker asking for a 50% pay rise - and it was being seriously considered by the (English) boss. If you asked for a 50% pay rise ANYWHERE else in the world, once your boss had stopped laughing, you would get a boot up the arse and then shown the door.

In the last 10 years wages have increased by 500% (from 2 kuai an hour to 10)

China is no longer the cheapest labour force in the world!

Time to start checking out some other 3rd world/developing countries!!

Africa anyone?

You saw that program too? haha

Yes they said, the guy said theres more worker than jobs in China -so workers pick anything they want and companies don't want to lose them and in UK theres more workers than jobs which is true.

It was a great program, didn't know you guys could watch it down there haha!