Q&A: Is it getting harder to be a full-time bookseller?
QUESTION: Can a person just starting out in the bookselling field today still make a full-time living at it -- like people used to be able to do about 7 to 10 years ago?I hear so many booksellers on eBay complaining that books sales are so bad, and that they can't make a living with the new fees. Is your book still congruent for today's seller, or has the market really changed since you wrote it?
ANSWER: I got into online bookselling six and a half years ago, right about the time it got popular. Third-party selling had just been introduced on Amazon, and Half.com was going like gangbusters.
Back then -- and ever since then -- there has been a vocal contingent of sellers who've said, "Things used to be great, and now they're terrible."
Personally, I never felt like there was a gold rush in Internet bookselling. And there's no doubt, things have gotten a lot more competitive. Sometimes I feel like I'm working harder and harder just to keep my head above water.
As far as being able to do it full time, it all depends on whether you have access to plenty of stock at reasonable prices. I'm lucky in that sense because I live near Washington D.C. and there's several libraries within easy driving distance. It's pretty unusual if I can't find two or three good library sales every weekend of the year. I suppose someone who lived in a very rural area without lots of nearby libraries would have it much tougher.
I still think online bookselling is a revolutionary way for an entreprenuer to have a viable home-based business with very low risk. But you have to put a lot of time and labor into this. It's not a get-rich-quick plan. For long periods, I've worked 10 hours a day on this, and I've never netted more than $40,000 a year selling used books. But I would never work 10 hours a day for someone else, so I don't complain about the way things are too much.
Regarding eBay, I prefer selling at fixed prices, so I do about 80 percent of my business on Amazon and the rest on eBay/Half, and I don't auction books anymore. I'm sure it's much harder now to auction common books on eBay for profit than it was five or six years ago because eBay has lost some of its novelty for people -- there are lots of other places to shop online now. (Collectibles are another story. If I specialized in collectibles, 80 percent of my business would probably be from eBay auctions and the other networks.)
Nevertheless, I stay active on eBay/Half.com because I don't want to have all my eggs in one basket. Sales on Amazon have been crummy lately for a variety of reasons, so I've stepped up my activity elsewhere.
And you're right -- I think there was a time when you could sell practically anything on eBay and make great profits. But that was before my time.
What does everyone else think? Is it still possible to make a full-time living as an online bookseller?
posted by Steve Weber at 4/30/2007
18 Comments:
So glad I'm not the only one to notice sluggish sales on Amazon. Still not sure why, though. Steve, you're saying for a variety of reasons -- do explain!
I just opened an eBay store, and it's marginally profitable at this point. By my math, a storefront is the only way to make any money selling books on eBay, but you have to turn some serious volume to make a profit on the current fee structure.
Two big problems with Amazon right now:
1. I think the free shipping offers from Amazon, the emphasis on Fulfillment by Amazon, and their new design to put FBA listings on top of ours unless we beat it by the amount of standard shipping -- that's putting a big dent in sales.
2. Glitches. There's some sort of payments glitch that's impeding orders on Amazon in the past couple of weeks. My volume is about 20 percent of normal for the past 10 days.
I argue that to make a full time living under current conditions you need to sell about 30 books a day. Your average sale (including shipping) will be around $12.50 if you are not a specialist. So ask yourself whether your supply and systems will generate 30 sales each and every day 50 weeks a year.
With the goofballs at Amazon cooking up yet another harebrained scheme every few months, you got to be crazy to rely on them for your livelyhood.
Scary...
As Steve said, don't put all your eggs into one basket (especially if that basket is Amazon).
You need to have another sideline runnig in the background, whether it's selling on Ebay, or whatever.
I started at eBay in 1995, when there were only 2 catagories and 1200 items for sale. It was great back then. I figured I made about $40 an hour selling books.
Here we are 12 years later, and selling books at eBay, in my opinion, is ridiculous. I can't even get 20 bucks for a Vintage Jesse Wilcox Smith book. The same book would have sold at eBay in the late 1990's for $100.00. I just sold, at eBay, an 1890's Poe book for $9.99. That's one third the price of a new harbound. eBay is a great place to sell collectibles, but not very good for books. There are always exceptions.
We are making a full time living selling on 8 different online venues, and that is for two families. My husband and I and my parents are working together on this full time. 30% of our sales come from our eBay store and 40% of our sales come from Amazon. I think the key is entering new books daily. We have a fairly large volume of inventory AND we're entering in the neighborhood of 800-1200+ new books in weekly. We average 60-70 sales daily. We also make sure that we go book scouting EVERY weekend. We've only been doing this for a year and a half, but we are working 6-7 days a week, 50+ hours a week! It's more than a full time job, but we love doing it!
There is always a group of "it was so much better last week/year/month/decade". However, it was certainly EASIER a few years ago. I remember the days on ebay when anything i listed would sell and for a very good price. Now, ebay is glutted and is a lousy venue for media except in ebay stores (and as ebay keeps making moves towards killing ebay stores, like the latest bumping them for EE), ebay is less and less viable.
The key is diversity. 1 or 2 venues is simply not enough. We sell on 14. Steady inventory additions is also important. Our FOL sales and yard sales are very seasonal, so we have to think creatively to fill in during the bad weather months. I alone do all the scouting, etc. so it's a lot for what is 90% a one-woman show in our house. Diversity in inventory is also good. Unless you are a very high end specialist, the days of the one genre seller have passed. We stock a variety of subjects and even media types.
Excellent customer service is also important. I can't count the number of (pardon my French) completely stupid sellers who post what they think is an appropriate response to some customer problem on seller message boards--what they come up with is completely appalling. Not every one possesses good customer service skills but if they don't develop them, it WILL hurt their business. Emotional knee-jerk responses are the worst possible thing you can do.
And I do agree with you Steve that not everyone lives in a book-rich area. Some of us have to hunt harder to find them. If you live in a metropolitan area or, even better, near a university, you are usually in in good shape. But books are everywhere. You just have to learn to be creative in the hunt.
30 books a day, priced at an average of $12.50 each, for 50 weeks gives you $131,250 a year... if that is what you need to stay alive and be in this profitably, i feel sorry for you... maybe you should consider moving out here rurally? we do... we have one library with a library sale once a year... the next largest metro area is 2.5 hours away... and somehow, someway, with the thrift stores, salvation armies, yard sales etc... we are making a profit... about $1100 a month at this point but i just started 4 months ago--- $1100 living where i do goes a long way folks... plus living rurally there is no competition and you find books that are far and above more odd and expensive than any you will find in a big city.... i say quit whining...
I was just approved as a Barnes and Noble seller. Has anyone else been selling on B&N? Is it worth it? Any advise?
This is a very timely question for me...My husband and I just moved from CA to rural WA, and plan to rely on my online book business to meet most of the bills. Luckily, we no longer have a mortgage, so that helps.
I started selling in 1999, and as such have seen huge changes. My sales on ebay are way down...however...my rare books still sell at a good price. I can keep up some pretty good sales on Amazon, if I keep the new inventory rolling in, which is much harder now that I don't have my standard thrift route anymore. Luckily, I arrived with about 50 boxes of books to list (the majority will have to be indexed on ebay.)
My sales are between 5-15/day. It really helps when there are a couple with a $20-$50 profit attached. On days when sales are low, my mood tends to get glum, on good days it rises. My current inventory on Amazon and ebay is only about 250 on each, so I know I need to spend my time listing,listing,listing.
I am confident lots of sellers will drop out of the field the way business is going. Those of us who love what we do, and can't think of anything else we'd rather do, hopefully will be able to weather the ups and downs.
Reminds me all a bit of the dot.com "revolution", I know quite a few people who dumped good jobs to make some huge amount of money at a new dot.com...and a year later were out of work. And I know some who still work at dot.coms, making decent money. The outcome depended a lot on the attitude of the person, slow and steady seems to win the race.
In response to the seller who has seen the prices of books drop on eBay, I would say it is simply more sellers than buyers now on eBay.. Also a book that was “rare” in 1990 is now abundant in 2007.
I think one of the big issues is lowballing and veteran sellers are not helping the problem. I recently saw a book that had 2 copies listed around $250. A lowballer with about an 84 % feedback rating listed one at 99.00. A seller with approx 6 thousand feedback at 99 % came in at 75.
My biggest pet peeve is sellers that “brag” at FOL sales, thrifts and other sources. I can’t count the number of dealers I’ve seen spill the beans about selling online. And lo and behold, another source dries up and a new seller emerges on Amazon.
I don't think someone just starting out should quit their present job and sell books full-time. It is a lot, I repeat, a lot, of hard work selling books as a sole proprietor working solo. You will never get rich at this, so forget about retiring early and buying real estate on Star Island in Miami.
I work out of a medium size metropolitan area with many universities (2.5 million metro population) and it is harder to find books for resale compared to 4 to 5 years ago (before scoutpal, etc., was in the hands of everyone).
To make it today, one needs, most importantly, a sizable inventory AND a ready supply of new inventory.
Forget about eBay unless you have collectible titles. Library sales...good luck.
But all the hardships are a test for all and a hurdle for new sellers. If you love this type of work (and I do) you will find a way to make it work. In the long run, all the amateurs and people who feel they can get rich quick will drop out, hopefully.
In short, the competition should make you not only work harder, but smarter.
12.50 * 250 (5 days 50 weeks) = $93,750 on 7500 units sold.
Less $17,625.00 postage, less $2000 packaging supplies, less $3000 rent, less $14,062 listing commissions, less $1200 listing fees, less $1875 credit card/paypal processing fees, less $15,000 cost of goods sold, less $1000 gas and auto expense... You are already down to $37,988 (I use the Median Household Income as a stand in for "full time living") and your not done. I am not whining nor promoting a particular lifestyle just trying to give folks an idea of what it takes.
I have the best inventory that I have had in 7 years, work twice as hard, and my sales are down about 30%.
And not to knock you Steve, but I blame it on more competition, and books telling people how to, and the Amazon seller boards where everyone gives away their secrets and tells new sellers exactly what to do--I mean, one doesn't even need to do any research on their own, they just post a question to the board "I can't find this book anywhere, how much should I price it?" and by gosh 20 sellers will pipe in that they found it here and there, and of course if the OP would've actually searched themselves they couldve found it, but they rather ahve other people do the work.
Plus all these fools telling everyone where to buy their stock. Competition for stock is fierce.
Ans while I do know that it takes hard work to stay in business, anyone can read books or the Seller boards and get in the game long enough to muck it up for the rest of us.
I think another issue that needs to be addressed is the quality of sellers. One thing about selling anything online, from books to clothes is the lack of professionalism required. Sellers do not need to submit a resume, or have to go through interview processes.In other words those who cant get a job due to lack of basic skills come to online sales.
In other words everyone and their grandmother can list a book on the river. And everyone and their grandma do.
I also have an odd feeling that many sellers are on some sort of subsidiary i.e. welfare, unemployment etc. Now I am not putting down people that use those services that need help. They are there for that reason, and I know it helps a lot of people that need thoe services.
But I think when your rent and food is covered; you really don’t care about dropping the prices of books etc.
I will be glad when the day comes when a tax id is required to sell online. And I think that day is actually coming closer than what we may realize. Recently members of congress were discussing the billions of dollars going through eBay each year.
It won’t take much longer for the politicians to get their hand in lost revenue.
My wife was reading romance novels for the last two years for something to do because she is disabled. We had around 200 books sitting around the house. To get rid of them she started selling online. I noticed the deposits of 50 or 60 dollars a month and started asking her questions. We did alot of checking on stuff and have just started selling online for a second income to help pay the medical bills. We have chose to sell low profit books and if we find a good one great. We might only make a half a dollar on most of our books but we do this to get a base of buyers. We spend more than most to package our books but we have excellent feedback and feel that this will help in the long run. We get only around 800 to a thousand a month in deposits and our costs only give us a profit of around 2 or 3 hundred if we are lucky. The good side of it is that my wife and I are doing something together and it takes her mind off her health issues. I feel that seeing we have only been doing "books" for six months that we are on the way to turning our little bit of pleasure into a nice second income. I tend to be more selective when we go to book sales but my wife is starting to see that I can let her know if we have a copy of a book so we don't double up. We sell on half and amazon and the only problem we have had is that our inventory got deleated two months into this adventure. I feel that if you give the customer a great book at a good price that they will come back and we have already seen repeat sales. I feel that you can do a good job and make a profit selling books but to make a living at it would be tough.
I am new to the business. I can't quit my other job yet but I enjoy scouting, selling and getting to read books for free. What I have not figured out is how is it possible to sell any book for a penny and not lose money with packaging, postage and seller fees?
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