Wake Up And Smell The Roses @-'-,-'-,--

ebay has certainly overturned the old stamp dealers' business model.

In years gone by, a dealer would have a huge inventory -- a collector wandering into his shop might want ANYTHING, and if the dealer had it he would expect to make a good mark-up, to cover the cost of that huge inventory.

With ebay you can become a 'dealer' with an inventory that would fit in a shoebox -- as long as you can turn stuff over quickly and you can buy cheap, then you can afford to have a much, much smaller margin. I always feel that my customers are getting a bargain -- only I got an even better bargain when I acquired my stock! There is no way a dealer operating the traditional model would be able to compete on price. And with ebay you will find a customer for whatever you have to sell, whether it be an imperf Franklin or an album full of CTO Mongolia.

If you are sitting on a big pile of inventory you are totally missing the way the game has changed.

Dealers make their money when they buy, not when they sell.
Don

"dealers make their money when they buy........" This comment makes me wonder. Some months ago, I sold my France and colonies collection through an auction house. Took two sales to make it happen. Catalog was $12,000+; lot of common stamps, but also a solid amount of higher catalog material. Winning bid was $900, before commission. Or about 6-7% of catalog.

Have no way of knowing who bought it. Maybe a dealer looking for a quick turnaround; maybe a collector. Even with the overall French market being rather "dormant," somebody still got a great deal. If it was a dealer, they could sell various items for 30% of Scott catalog and still quadruple their money. I'm not upset about the result though. I got a check which will go towards purchases in my specialty areas. And I was able to downsize my world wide collection by a bit. I always remember that this is a hobby, not an investment vehicle.

Will politely disagree with steevh comment: "with ebay, you will find a customer for whatever you have to sell....." Maybe, maybe not.

Climber Steve - Was it Rasdale? I sold a massive amount of cv through them last year and somebody got an absolutely smoking deal at 5% of cv. On the other side though I bought a four carton lot at Rasdale last year that I pulled $70,000 of BC out of. I paid $700. I do not think that they look very hard. There was CTO mongolian on the top. Once you dug in a couple of inches it was amazing.

Steve - I don't think I'd describe French material as "dormant", here at least. But there is a large supply, which keeps prices down. I only really look at a couple of auctions, but they always have a steady stream of what seem to be decent collections with some of the higher CV items.

"DEALERS MAKE THEIR MONEY WHEN THEY SELL " that is not true . .......Maybe the few honest stamp dealers do when they deal with knowledge experience buyers and fellow ASDA and APS MEMBERS .

Come with me to a stamp show or bourse and it will be a different story .

Then there is the famous old one "Three postal history dealers were alone on a desert island, and all three made money".

The percentage of people selling stamps that are true dealers is small. The lions share now are simply folks that buy carton lots and throw it out there and bingo, call themselves dealers. The ASDA logo means nothing either. Anthony's is a member and proudly displays the ASDA logo. Most of these people could very well sell underwear on ebay. Stamps are just another retail item to them.

rogdcam; A few months ago I tried to make this exact argument about myself and it didn't go well.

"stamps are just another retail item " Those dealers don't last very long . Because the hours of learning goes far beyond any money they make .

rogdcam: answer to your question is YES. I wish I had the time to buy a multi-carton lot and then try to sell it off. Unfortunately, while "stamping" is a long time hobby and activity, it isn't the only activity for me.

Old saying: don't ever retire. You won't have time to do anything.

Buying multi-carton lots at the right price is not nearly as easy to do as it sounds. It takes skill and practice plus a lot of knowledge to do so accurately.

Agree with REVCOLLECTOR ,It does take a lot of knowledge both philatelic and marketing . ebay has some 6,000,000 listing and you have to know both where and how to sell in that marketplace .

Agreed that it takes skill and knowledge to do things the right way. On the other hand their is a preponderance of ebay sellers that have little interest in knowlege because the majority of bidders have the same or lower level of knowledge. There are many medium sized sellers that derive their income, whether primary or secondary, catering to this type of collector and have little incentive to rise to another level. The psychological makeup of ebay bidders is puzzling. For quite a while I would purchase nice items, at Siegel for instance, to add to my collection and I would list the items on ebay at high, high retail and most of the items would sell. They could easily purchase these items themselves at auction but the word ebay seems to imply a bargain even when reality dictates otherwise.