RESELLING ON MERCARI

Reselling continues. Finally focused on Mercari and made a sale within a few days. I hadn't paid much attention to Mercari because the packaging and postage procedures were not as simple as Poshmark's. With Poshmark the seller can use the USPS Priority Mail cardboard boxes, which made it quick and easy to get the package to the post office. With Mercari I had to calculate the postage (Mercari has all the tools to guide you step by step to do this) and buy a box. I like to send the items out within one day of my sale. But since I had to buy a box and could not get to the store so fast the item was shipped in two days. Mercari has a direct communication link between seller and buyer so I let the buyer know the shipping would be delayed a day. The buyer was understanding.

One of the unique aspects of Mercari when compared with Poshmark is the buyer and seller can rate each other. The person may click on a number of qualities such as friendly, communications, understanding. For this first sale my buyer gave me this 5 star review and listed these attributes; friendly, reliable and great packaging.

Turns out my Mercari experience wasn't as challenging as I thought it would be. In fact it was smooth sailing. (Once I bought that box!) When I have vacation time I'll spend time with this platform.

I've now sold through a range of reselling methods: The Real Real, Poshmark, Mercari, ThredUp and Crossroads Trading. I've a few things lined up to test out Tradesy and Rebag. From my seller's point of view, I believe certain items fare better on certain sites. Knowing which sites to sell the items on is THE question I hope to solve! Stay tuned.

KISS @GAP

For years Gap has been one of my go to stores for buying basic cotton T-shirts for wearing at home. Glancing at an email from Gap this morning noticed there was a 40% promotion (with exclusions) and then another 10% off if shopped as a Rewards member. Too much fine print to read! Yet the prices of Gap T-shirts don't influence my purchase so no big deal. While walking around the Gap store today noticed signage for some items at 50% off, some 30% off and others for 20% off. These promotions didn't match my email but wasn't concerned. I prefer saving my retail energy and "fights" for higher priced items at other retailers where the percentage discount matters and could be a meaningful dollar amount savings.

After examining a few T-shirt styles, made my selection which I took from a pile that had a 20% off signage (not matching with the 40% off offer in my email) and joined the line to check out. I waited in the line and kept waiting. This long wait bothered me. Why wasn't the line moving?

Focusing on the two cashiers and their customers I heard the customers were asking about the prices and promotions associated with each of their items they wanted to purchase. One customer took out her iphone to show what she thought was a discrepancy in her promotional email compared with the price of the item in the store. Then another customer asked for the price of each item she wanted to buy. The cashiers were patient and told the customers the discount associated with each item. This took time and prolonged the wait to pay! The T-shirt I paid for was next to signage noting 20% off; yet it rang up as a 40% discount. Nice the discount matched the email. But I don't know how that happened! A strong explanation is that I put in my phone number for the cashier to pull my Rewards number. But I did not receive the additional 10% off noted in the email. Oh maybe a Rewards member is one who has a Gap credit card. This is too much to figure out!

Gap's management could fix this long wait to pay the customers experienced today (These waits probably occur on many days since Gap seems to have promotions almost every day.) and clear up the dense emails. They should look to the 50+ years old KISS principle: "Keep It Simple Stupid." Specifically, make it clear on the store signage if it matches what is in the promotional emails. It will also be helpful for those not receiving promotional emails. This simple information will make shopping easier and lead to the check out line move faster.

RESELLING AND THEN THERE IS MORE RESELLING...

The other day Poshmark sent me an email with the message title that was new to me. "Your listing has been Reposhed. I knew reposhed / reposhing is a thing but didn't know what it meant. As with all things having to do with reselling and consignment I was eager to learn more.

Reading through the email and then looking for the item that was reposhed I learned an Alexis Bittar necklace that sold for $53 was listed for sale by the person who purchased it from me a few months ago.

The first image below is from the email and the second one shows one of the photos in my listing, along with my favorite four letter word "SOLD". The photo on the right shows the reposher used my photo. Using my photo is a great way for me to get publicity as on the bottom right of the photo is shows: Reposhed from nycolors. "nycolors" is my handle on Poshmark.

The reposhed item was sold at a lower price than what I sold the item. Interestingly, as I've found with other listings on Poshmark, the same item is offered by different sellers at different prices. Just today I saw a listing of this necklace for close to $100 on Poshmark. The condition of the item is a key driver in pricing. The condition of my necklace was very good- maybe excellent so seeing it priced for much more is a concern. In earlier posts I've written about the concerns I have with pricing my used items. Yet, decluttering is a leading reason for selling on Poshmark so no need to stress.

In Poshmark's email it points out that a benefit of reposhing is that is extends the life cycle for my item "to fuel a sustainable future." That is good news. Additionally the reposher could buy something else and enjoy something new. More good news.

Reselling, consigning and related is a hobby and I work on this during the weekends and maybe a few hours one or two nights a week. If I had more time to devote to this, I'd consider focusing on one or only a few product lines such as tops or jewelry or maybe just a particular size. This specialization might lead to creating well thought out pricing and operating strategies.

For now though, I'm curious to know what Alexis Bittar thinks about all this reposhing!