But frankly there's not been too much exciting to report. There have been a couple of 200+ card orders, which was very nice. And a couple other multi-card orders (not that large), including a return customer (which is a compliment in itself).
Last week was the first time my Dad's audiobook auctions took a loss. Only one audiobook sold, for $3, and it cost $3.50 to list them all. What a bummer! Of course, to underscore the vagaries of eBay, the current batch had a bid on one of them for $9.99 within an hour of its being listed - go figure!
My Global Priority Mail boxes from the USPS finally arrived today. Now if anyone from outside the US buys comics from me, I can save some money on materials because the box is free!
Speaking of boxes, the last time I bought some for comic shipping over eBay they cost me ~$0.70 apiece, which was much more than the previous time I had purchased (that seller no longer has listings on eBay, I'm afraid). The boxes I bought have variable depth - they can be cut to be 6, 4, or 2 inches deep. I so far have not used anything but 2 inches, so I'm always cutting boxes, and wasting cardboard (not to mention money). The company I got the new boxes from, Uline, has a website and I checked them out. It turns out that 1) they have a box the same l/w, but only 2.75 inches deep for only ~$0.40 each, and 2) the boxes I bought I could have gotten for cheaper directly through them (I bought them through a middle-man on eBay). So, I ordered 100 of the 2.75 boxes, and will reserve what's left of the variable-depth ones for large orders (should I ever have any).
In other news, I had a customer buy a set of comics from me, then never pay! No email at all, no sign of life to speak of. I sent two friendly reminders, then filed an nonpaying bidder report with eBay. Today I filed for the final value fee credit, which gives the customer a strike, and left negative feedback for them. I hate to do it, but I've not much choice. Who buys something and then disappears?!?!
Also, I have dropped below 1950 items in the store - sales haven't been too horrible!
A potential customer from Germany wrote yesterday to ask how much shipping would be for 10 comics and 50 cards. Hopefully the quote ($21.50 for Global Priority) didn't chase him off!
ALERT! As I write this, someone in Italy is putting together a large(ish? - 27 cards for $4.35 so far) Magic order. VERY exciting...
Oh, and did I mention that I did indeed send off three comics to be graded by the CGC? I'll report when they arrive on how well they rated, and of course post links for the three items when they make it to the store.
Well, I think that's all the latest. More will follow - hopefully with not as large a gap as the last couple of times!
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