Continued from part 1.
My own story of reselling Costco product online is triumphant, even though it was short-lived. For a couple of years in a row Costco stocked a product called the EZ-Goal, a collapsible ice hockey training goal. I had bought one for myself the first time Costco stocked them for around $125. The next year when Costco got them in they were $128 and the EZ-Goal website in the USA listed them for US$180. Costco sold a few the second time around but they slowed down and were not moving to many after a while. Initially the price dropped to $99.97 which was a steal in my books but they still were not moving.
Costco dropped the price further to $49.97 and I knew that was a crazy price. I thought about it for a while and decided not to buy any but that played in my head all night. The next day I decided I had to buy some. A visit to the Docklands Costco on the way home from work was made and three EZ-Goals were purchased and loaded into my car.
From there my plan was a little risky. I wanted to run the play of using ’99 cent’ eBay Auctions. There were competitors on eBay selling the same item for much more than the Costco price and I saw this as the best way to beat them and move my stock quickly. A 99 cent auction is where you start the item at 0.99 cents and this tends to grab people’s attention and gets bargain hunters watching your item. The item’s price will usually stay low for the first few days of the auction attracting peoples‘ interest.
This plan worked well for my auctions although my final values did seem to slow down by the third listing. The auctions went for $169.49, $138.59 and $107.50. On the three goals I sold through eBay and I grossed a total $415. That was a tidy profit of $265 for my $150 investment and 177% profit margin!
Am I likely to try this again? Maybe not quite like this as I was a little worried I was not going to make my money back. I would consider stocking a few different lines that I know are cheap at Costco and listing them on eBay as ‘Buy It Now’ offerings. I am always surprised by just how cheap items like Calvin Klein underwear are at Costco even compared to the online discounters and I think there are profits to be made. It probably does mean carrying stock much longer though and that is what I am not really interested in right now. Instead I will leave it open to you, the Loaded Trolley readers, to give it a go. Let us know if you make some money reselling Costco lines.