Seller Spotlight: GOing1nceAMC Sally Milo is a 52-year-old eBay Trading Assistant doing business under the GOing1nceAMC ID. She makes her living on eBay selling items on consignment for other individuals and businesses. Originally from Detroit, Sally now lives in Tucson, Arizona. A graphics designer/illustrator by training, she started selling on eBay in 1999, when a coin-collector friend asked her to manage his eBay auctions; Sally had the computer and graphic skills that would be useful in such an endeavor. (She continues to manage her friend's coin auctions today, under the AzBCC ID.) In March of 2003 Sally and her partner Kyle Bennett set themselves up as eBay Trading Assistant resellers; their eBay Store (stores.ebay.com/GOing1nceAMC) is shown in Figure 13.5. Figure 13.5. The About Me page for GOing1nceAMC. 
To attract clients, Sally and Kyle started out by going door-to-door to businesses they thought might be potential clients. Of the 18 companies they visited during their first day of cold calling, 8 of them became clients. Sally continues to attract new clients by telling everyone she runs into about her eBay business, and by handing out lots of business cards. She also says that her listing in eBay's Trading Assistant directory has provided her with several clients. Today, GOing1nceAMC resells a wide variety of items for their consignment customers. They've sold things as small as a single fava bean (previously owned by a late Mafia godfather) to as large as a several-ton manufacturing furnace. They have no restrictions on what they'll accept on consignment, as long as it's not prohibited by eBay. Like many Trading Assistants, Sally launched her business out of her homealthough by the time you read this, she should have her brand-new drop-off location open. Before she decided to go the storefront route, everything about her business was home-based; her living room was her shipping room and photo studio, a former bedroom was her warehouse, and a former den was her packing materials room. Obviously, having a retail storefront will change all that. Sally and Kyle don't charge a set-up fee for regular items; bidding begins at $9.99 for a 7-day auction. They also offer a premium plan for higher-priced items, which does have a setup fee ($19.99) and begins bidding at a higher price for a 10-day auction. The bulk of their revenues come from their selling commissions, which start at 40% of the final selling price and operate on a sliding scale from there. In a typical week, GOing1nceAMC will have at least 20 items listed for auction on eBay. They have a very high sell-through rate, selling more than 95% of the items they listalthough some of those items sell upon relisting, rather than during the initial auction period. During the whole of 2005 their sales averaged from $2,000 to $4,000 per month, with sales climbing closer to $10,000 per month toward the end of the year. Sally says that their most memorable sale started when a long-time client asked them to list 11 old decks of playing cards. They priced each deck from $5 to $20. One of the $20 decks was quite nice, she remembers, but they couldn't dig up any information about them. This particular item ended up in a bidding war among a few bidders, and ultimately sold for $2,575. Needless to say, both Sally and the client were amazed byand quite happy withthe final price. The buyer, a Norwegian card collector, told them that particular deck had not been offered anywhere in nearly 30 years. Sally has the following advice for anyone wanting to start an eBay consignment business: "First, get a good amount of experience selling your own stuffcollectibles you have around your home and nifty items you picked up at the flea market. And buy some stuff from your fellow eBayers to get an idea how sales are handled from the customer's point of view, and to build up your feedback. Of course, to be a registered eBay TA, you must meet the requirements. Know and act as a professional businessperson!" You can learn more about Sally and Kyle's consignment business at the GOing 1nce website (www.going1nce.com). | 
