by HowardH » Sat Jan 14, 2006 4:01 pm
I'm currently on my 3rd batch of fiddles, and the 4th is on its way from China now.
I have had an epiphany of sorts. More that just a whack up side the head, but more like smack with a 2x4 between the eyes. Here's how this came about: It became fairly obvious after watching my wife go through the motions to become a powerseller that eBay just doesn't scale. By that, I mean that in order to sell twice as much of anything on ebay, you have to work at least twice as hard. My initial approach was to get violins from China, do some initial setup, and sell them with some value-added stuff (complete setup, with a fingerboard decal, decent strings, etc.) that basically was too much of a bother for most of the ebay sellers.
So far, so good. I didn't have to take new pictures, and write new descriptions like my wife did for her plus-size women's clothing, so I was selling almost as much dollar volume with about 20% of the effort she had to put in. So despite the fact that I knew that ebay doesn't scale well (heh heh, I figured I had a pretty good system after improving on my wife's approach), I increased the number of auctions I was running. At one point, I hit >150 active auctions. A dramatic increase (about 7x) of auction listing activity only doubled my sales, but increased my costs by 7x, and increased the amount of time I had to spend keeping stuff straight by more than 10x. I started making the occasional error in shipping or billing... After my first $400+ invoice for ebay fees, I decided I had enough of that. Ebay was doing great, but I wasn't.
So, I cut my listings back to fewer than 20, and started listing only once a week. I implemented some suggestions that I got from friends (and competitors -- in this business, the true competition consists of pretty good people). Result: My sell-through rate more than tripled, and my workload got cut by 90%, so I was actually making (a little) money again.
But that's not the end of that story. I was generally pleased with the quality of the violins I was getting from my current supplier (especially after getting ripped off twice by other Chinese suppliers), so I took a chance and ordered a couple of high-dollar instruments, and some carbon-fiber bows, along with 100 sets of some custom strings made to my specifications (for which I still have an exclusive), and some other very nice accessories. I listed one of the better violins for a premium price, along with a cello, some premium carbon-fiber bows, and a 17-inch (monster!) viola. They all sold in two weeks!!!! GACK! I just made more profit on 6 sales than I had made in the last 18 months of ebay sales, and it didn't take any more work to prepare a $600 violin than it does to set up a $160 violin! There's the 2x4 between the eyes!
QUALITY, not QUANTITY!
There is a market for high-quality instruments on ebay! I have successfully bootstrapped myself into position to sell $600-$1200 instruments against the junk peddlers who sell $40-$60 (expensive firewood) instruments. I think it mostly boils down to credibility; I've had very good feedback on my FAQ page, and I've had spendid results from my phone-demos (every instrument I've demoed on the phone, including the cello -- which I don't play all that well -- has sold immediately). One thing I really need to do is start making video clips to demo my better instruments, so that folks can download & view them any time.
I still plan to offer the <$200 violins, because I really believe it's good to offer a decent (if not particularly great) instrument that is adequate for a beginner, but won't break a family's budget. And, I still teach violin and viola lessons, not so much for the money as for the enjoyment. Hey, life is too short not to have fun!