Say Anything Blog

Rob, most of the businesses that have left are smaller sellers because most of ebay is comprised of smaller sellers.

This raise has, in fact, hurt the big boys as well, particularly in the media category (DVDs, Books, Magazines, CDs) where sell-through is traditionally low.

Last week Ebays largest media seller, Movie Marz, announced they will be pulling up their ebay stakes and moving on.  With 1.2 million items, they cannot sustain a 350% fee increase.

Many other large (200k+ items) have also voiced similar intentions, and others who’ve remained silent are quietly reducing their inventory.

Ebay will no longer be the place to buy movies, music or books.  Those that remain will be priced more unattractively to compensate for fees.

Amazon took much of Ebay’s media business, now they’ll have nearly all of it.

Rob, the quote you gave on the fee increase [6%] is inaccurate. While this figure was quoted by Bill Cobb (President eBay North America Sales), in truth, the actual figure jumps from 10%-40% depending on the volume of the ebay store seller.  While eBay consumes 10%-15% of gross sales on every item sold, by squeezing more fees from sellers, they are now making more profit than the sellers themselves.  It is more than just ‘Mom and Pop’ sellers who no longer can afford to list on eBay, a lot of elderly citizens who make a limited income from ebay to suppliment their already small fixed income are pushed out the door too.

Bottom line? Consumers will have less choices and higher prices for the upcomming Christmas season.

eBay should go out of business, if market forces are in operation.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.