Seller’s Story : why we’re quitting eBay

June 26, 2008

When I first started hanging around on the PowerSeller Board, longer ago than I like to remember, one of the people I really looked up to was Louise from Boxes & Busts. She seemed to have achieved exactly what I wanted to achieve myself: her own business, based around eBay but not exclusively reliant upon it. Over the last few years, I’ve watched her and soon-to-be-husband Paul expand their business, set up a great website and fill a warehouse with their stock. And then this week, she told me the sad news that as of next month, Boxes & Busts will no longer be trading on eBay. Here’s what Lou had to say:

My first taste of eBay came in November 2001 when we purchased a small occasional oak table. I then discovered gemstones and mounts and started making my own jewellery which I sold thorough - where else - eBay. From there Paul and I started a business selling jewellery through party plan. We had to buy some gift boxes for our own use and could only get them retail in small quantities. After a few months we had some spare boxes and started selling them on eBay. The rest is history.

We started purchasing to sell and Boxes & Busts was born in June 2002, selling not only jewellery boxes, but all sorts of retail display items. At that time there was very little of this type of thing being sold on the site and we quickly grew until we had over 1500 ads running at any one time. We outgrew home when it started getting dangerous to move around - you know the sort of thing - the dining room and one bedroom was a store room, the kitchen table was the packing table, another bedroom was the office and under the stairs was another store room. When the furniture in the lounge started getting closer to the centre of the room, we moved into a 2100sq ft trade warehouse in July 2003 and that’s where we still trade from, although we are now bulging at the seams with approx 2500 lines. We’ve also started our own website at www.boxesandbusts.co.uk.

During our time on eBay the site has changed phenomenally. As with any success story when people see what they believe is easy money to be made, they all jump on the bandwagon. Lots of hobby sellers started selling for minimal profit; lots have come and gone, but our superb service and quality of stock has stood the test of time.

In our early days, being a powerseller was quite an achievement and we were very proud of that status. Then in a move typical of eBay they changed the goal posts and hobby sellers were now powersellers and not businesses. Now the best part of having powerseller status is the Powerseller Forum.

The real start of our demise on eBay came when sellers from the Far East started listing directly on the UK site for less than we could import for, coupled with the change of search default making the worldwide option the first thing buyers saw. We have altered the way we trade to try and overcome this but there is no way we can compete with the prices these sellers can offer. Then to add insult to injury, US visibility ended. Within a short period of time we lost close to 80% of our eBay business.

It is with much regret we are leaving the site. It has been a decision made over a period of time but when we did some number crunching again this month it became much easier to bring down the final hammer. With the lower turnover we were now doing it means the that the latest changes to feedback have put our business at the mercy of what could be a few vindictive buyers or competitors. We are not prepared to keep going any longer under these conditions.

The days are long gone when trading on here was fun. It seems a long time ago when we used to be excited to switch on the computer in the morning.

The future is a rosy one for the business as a whole though, www.boxesandbusts.co.uk is thriving and due for a revamp soon to add our new service and some more refinements. The hot foil printer now means we will soon be offering our customers the choice to have their details on their boxes and we plan to introduce additional services such as stationary and promotional items to complement their boxes etc. We will cease trading on eBay on 31st July 2008.

There are undoubtedly people who will characterise this as failure: of B&B on eBay, or more likely, of eBay itself. I don’t think this is the case. Boxes and Busts is an amazing success story: one of a business which has deftly adapted to changing circumstances, which has used eBay to achieve independence, which hasn’t been bound to its own beginnings and which seems to me to have a bright future. Well done, Lou and Paul!

Got a story to tell about your business and eBay? Let us know.

Written by Sue Bailey · Filed Under Featured, Selling Tips | 32 Comments