How To Become A Millionaire Selling Mugs on Ebay

[Zipdorf]

The following are my observations for selling Coffee Mugs on Ebay. Based on selling an average of 100 per month, which would normally take a few weeks or months to build up to.

The costs are based on offering a good quality mug and buying in small quantities (as this is the way most people will start out).

Please note ** in my experience not every mug will sell every month. If you list 400 items you won’t sell one of each. So I have based this on my own sales (your experience may be different) of selling 1 out of 4 items listed (average).

Perhaps the more experienced sellers can offer advice to help us newer members bring down our costs and expand our businesses. I know an account with Royal Mail will bring down postage costs but the exercise is to make a profit from the mug and keep postage costs down to gain good feedback rating.

The initial costs in buying equipment – mug press £350, printer £120 and misc items plus your time in making the mugs will be on top of these and reduce the profit. Taxes will also have to be paid on any profits.

Mugs - Purchased 72 at a time £0.95
postage for above charged by current supplier £0.10
Sublimation Ink - based on 500 mugs per set of inks £0.34
Sublimation Paper £0.13
Heat Tape £0.01
Mug blanket wear and tear depreciation costs £0.15
Printer depreciation costs £0.30
Total of production costs £1.98
VAT on above costs at 20% £0.40
TOTAL COSTS FOR PRINTING A MUG = £2.38

Ebay shop (based on selling 100 items) £0.15
Listing cost per month £0.10
** If only 25% of mugs sell - extra listing costs £0.30
Ebay final selling fee £0.50
PayPal Fees (including postage fee) £0.70
TOTAL OF EBAY AND PAYPAL SELLING COSTS = £1.75

Profit on selling mug at £4.99 (less above costs) = £0.86
This does NOT allow for spoils or mispressed mugs

Postage Costs - 2nd class small package £2.60
Polystyrene Mailing Boxes £0.28
postage for above charged by current supplier £0.10
Postage labels and packing tape £0.05
TOTAL COSTS FOR SHIPPING MUGS = £3.03

So if you can sell about 25,000 MUGS a week on Ebay then you too can become a millionaire!

[pisquee]

So, you're making and selling an average of 100 mugs a month on Ebay for 86p profit each?
So, for your efforts, you only get £86 a month?
Or are your numbers hypothetical?

(and this not taking into account tax, electric, rent, rates...)

[Zipdorf]

Hi

I was rather hoping for advice and constructive ways of moving the business forward from people who have "been there and done that". As I mention (and we all have to start at zero), this is based on the first few weeks of a normal operation. Feedback like that I can get from my wife!

Also, I wanted a lot of people to be aware of ALL the costs involved. I have several income streams and although it wouldn't even cover my golf club fees for a month, a profit is a profit.

The idea of posting this was to start a discussion with helpful advice for all. I hadn't found anything like it on the forum.

[GoonerGary]

In the good old days it was £6.99 plus £3 postage. Not worth the effort now.

[Zipdorf]

There are people selling several hundred mugs per week on Ebay. With a Royal Mail account bringing the postage costs down to £1.80 and buying power to bring overheads (and Ebay fees) down by about 30% then a reasonable return on investment can be made. I would guess less than 10% of the members of this forum are making a full time living from their efforts and the idea was to inspire and help with input from that group. Reading the new postings I can see a lot of people get into this business and don't realise all the costs involved and they could be selling great products at a loss. This forum is all about helping people. Even the most successful had to start somewhere. The old days are gone, which is why at my advanced age I have to know about Facebook, Twitter, how to produce videos for YouTube, build a Wordpress website, add a shopping cart and hook the whole lot up to the merchant account I use for other businesses and also incorporate PayPal. Not easy but better than burying my head in the sand and saying "we didn't have those things in my day".....
£86 profit this month - £8,600 profit this time next year. There is at least one company whose accounts at companies house show they make over £100,000 profit from selling such items on Ebay, and that is after the directors have taken a nice salary as well. I'd get out of bed for that!

[Justin]

So if you can sell about 25,000 MUGS a week on Ebay then you too can become a millionaire!

Yep, the rest is easy...this is the tricky part! lol

[Andrew]

There is at least one company whose accounts at companies house show they make over £100,000 profit from selling such items on Ebay, and that is after the directors have taken a nice salary as well. I'd get out of bed for that!

Which ebay user is this? PM me the name if you can if you don't want to post it.

Costs can be brought down on what you have posted which has been discussed various times before. The other main thing I would say is that there is far more business to get if you look beyond ebay.

[Justin]

The other main thing I would say is that there is far more business to get if you look beyond ebay.

Do tell!

[Andrew]

It just takes some diverse thinking sometimes to end up with some useful new revenue streams. There are many out there as I have supplied through many different sectors in the past. Another thing I think often hinders people is that they tend to only think locally when trying to sell beyond ebay. The internet /email /phone allows you to sell anywhere and with a combination of the 3 you can chase down business rather than sit and wait for a sale to come through on a website.

All slightly cryptic but hard to give specifics without giving away trade secrets :-0

[Zipdorf]

The company concerned are not stupid. They have spread things over a number of shops on Ebay. It's only because in my past life, one of my businesses was as a Private Investigator that I know where to look to find this info. How come people seem more interested in the "Get Rich Quick" details than posting helpful information to this thread?

I don't think it benefits anyone to expose their niche markets. They have spent time and a lot of effort building a strong business. Good luck to them. The last thing any of us need is some short sighted person trying to undercut prices and make a quick buck. How many of YOU want to discuss your best income streams on an open forum like this?