A Comprehensive Guide To Selling Vintage Clothing Online On eBay Or A Website

Auction Bytes Vintage Clothing Discussion Forum

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• Where do you find all those clothes?
• How did you get started?
• Why do you do it?
• What do you do for a real job?
• It seems so easy just to take pictures of clothing and sell it...is it??

To clear it all up right now....taking pictures of clothing and listing is only 10% of the overall work, and I know sellers that would say that percentage is even lower.

Everyone has their own style, and I am just basing all of these explanations on my style. For example, I do not use live models. I have thought about it, however I love my classic appeal of the dress form...and in the end it is all what I like! However, there are countless ways to sell & present vintage, not to mention what is chosen to sell. These are all a minor reflection of the seller's style!

MY work percentages break down as follows;

1. 50% Pilfering ~ Endless hours of thrifting, estate sales & cold calling to achieve the desired amount and type of inventory! Pilfering includes such on-the-job hazards as mold, mildew, and for those in larger cities...injury!Buying many items you don't want just to get the 3 items you do want is another reality
2. 20% Research ~ A MUST to be a good vintage seller. Being informed makes you more money and makes you a valid competitor in the market. Listing items in wrong era catagories is a mistake that does not get un-noticed. Researching your label can help avoid the costly mistake of not mentioning a label in the title, which can cost hundreds

So where do I find the clothes anyway??

Read my pilfering description...this is where I get them. I have other secret sources that would surprise anyone...but that is my secret!

Finding clothes all depends on your location! I lived in a big city when I started this and live in a way smaller city now. I nearly lost my limbs at estate sales in the bigger city, and yet I find too much in my current city, to the point where I have to pass up the stuff that is not so desirable yet saleable

How did I get started??

Honestly..I do not know. It started with ebay selling things I had, then branched out. I had a small collection of vintage things that I liked, and when I saw how they were doing on ebay, I decided to get more and get started. It has been 4+ years of trial and error to learn what I know now...

Why do I do it??

Because I like the challenge of it. My extreme anal-retentive, controlling Ariesness drives me to do everything I can to be better! I improve myself daily in this business and I learn so much! Giving new life to these vintage beauties is important!

I am a huge fan of history, and doing the research is 70% of my fun and the other 30% feeds my artistic side with photography....I just love it!

This question reminds me of a question I heard very often when I was a designer at Home Depot...I would be standing there in my orange apron and someone....without fail....would always come up to me and ask...

"Do you work here??"

I mean...how do you answer that without being a smartass?? You can't

Answer?? I work more now than I ever did at any of my high profile Kitchen Design jobs...so enough said!

Is It Easy...and how do I do it??

Hours and HOURS and HOURS of work!

I have built everything I have of this business myself and I am proud of it! I build my branding, my website and spend very little $$ marketing it! I market through myspace , which is 100% free and is worth the time for the amount of traffic it brings in. Link exchanges bring in a surprising amount of traffic as well

I don't pay for shopping carts and merchant accounts, I build my website and link each item through Yahoo and use a free shopping cart service. This process will be described in a future topic.

I use Ebay on a very limited basis due to the cost associated with selling on eBay. I have built my website to be successful through the use of eBay in the past and have a goal to free completely from eBay.

Websites are so easy anymore, there is just no excuse not to have one if you want one. I used Shopify with success!

Feel free to comment or question about other methods! This is what works best for me...and this is just a small guide to give you a realistic take on how I do business! Enjoy!