The saga of Toothless Xena Fan

[Computer_God]

I own a small computer store and we also happen to sell things on Ebay for people. It's a little extra income and gives my assistant something to do so I'm not paying someone to just sit there and answer the phone if I'm on a service call.

This epic tale begins three years ago before I had help in the store.

Fellow comes in wanting to sell an autographed photo of Xena Warrior Princess and some other woman on the show. Some sort of limited edition photo set. No problem there.

What I DID have a problem with is that this guy is physically repulsive. Body odor, halitosis, greasy, unkempt hair, dirty clothes, missing teeth, broken glasses. Probably around 50 years old. Also seems to be hard of hearing. I have a tendency to nickname most of my customers, so he obviously became "Toothless Xena Fan".

He has sort sort of fascination with big screen TVs and was trying to get me to help him to purchase one on Ebay, and was asking me all about them. Well, I don't know Jack about TV sets, so I pretty much just politely told him I couldn't help him there.

One time a year or two ago he brought in a couple of vintage telephones to sell on Ebay. There was a layer of... grime on them. I had to wipe them down with Windex. I had to tell the guy if he brought in anything else like that I would charge him a cleaning fee. Gross.

He's also insiunated that he enjoys watching porno on his big TV. Now, I like porn as much as the next guy, but of all the people to discuss it with, I don't want it to be this guy.

I think the guy probably has no friends and for some reason he comes by the store every couple of months to tell me about whatever his latest purchase is or to ask my opinion about TV sets and such. I finally took to ducking down behind the counter when I saw him coming (my desk is right up near our front window) and after coming in and seeing no one there, he leaves.

As I said, I now have help in the store in the form of a nice young woman in her mid-twenties. She sits in the back of the store and types up Ebay auctions. She's very nice and very good at her job. Well, Toothless Xena Fan stopped by the store a week or so ago and I instinctively hit the dirt. What I hadn't counted on was him walking to the back of the store and bothering my Ebay girl. Initially he just asked where her boss was (she just said I stepped out, having seen me dive below the counter) which would have been fine, but then he starts trying to strike up a conversation about whatever electronics he just purchased. Fortunately my Ebay girl made an excuse that she was extremely busy (she was, anyway) and he left her alone. But dammit... now I'm going to have to talk to this guy if he comes back in when she's working... I can't possibly subject this poor girl to this guy's smell and annoying tendencies.

The guy always struck me as creepy... and if I picked up the newspaper tomorrow and saw that he got busted for child pornography, it wouldn't surprise me in the least.

[depechemodefan]

Ew.

I love eBay (um, sort of) but I hate when people hear they can make money off of it, not taking in account there are shipping charges and auction charges. And that they need to know how to use a computer. People are always coming in wanting the librarian to tell them how to sell on eBay, but they don't want a book, they just want us to tell them how to do it.

[Computer_God]

Ew.

I love eBay (um, sort of) but I hate when people hear they can make money off of it, not taking in account there are shipping charges and auction charges. And that they need to know how to use a computer. People are always coming in wanting the librarian to tell them how to sell on eBay, but they don't want a book, they just want us to tell them how to do it.

Wow - I didn't know "Ebay Selling" was something that all librarians knew how to do! LOL.

Yes, I have more than a few stories about our Ebay experiences. We don't really push the service *that* much as we make more from doing computer repairs, but it's a nice little extra income and as I said it gives my phone-answering-person something to do if me and my helper are both out on service calls.

I'd say about 10% of the people coming in are completely delusional about how much their stuff should be worth. My favorite was a couple (nice enough, but unreasonable expectations) who were moving and wanted to sell a bedroom set and a dining room set. They were looking to get something like $1000 - $1500 for the stuff. Granted, it was expensive when they got it, but the turnaround value on modern furniture like that is pretty low. They wouldn't hear it, though - paid extra money for the reserves on the auctions and so forth.

I think the bedroom set ended up getting bid to $200 and the dining room set $150.

At least they had the sense to put a reserve on so they weren't giving it away, but they learned a valuable lesson about supply and demand.


We typically take 36% of the final bid for stuff we sell... it's a little high, but I know other places have charged more, so it's pretty much a nice average. I get folks who come in sometimes and complain that it's too high a percentage, and such-and-such a place is only 32% for example. Well, on a $50 sale you're talking a difference of two bucks, and if you're going to drive 10 miles away to the other Ebay place, you're spending that much in gas, as opposed to coming here, in your own town.


We also have the advantage of being the only Ebay store left within a 10-minute drive or so... the others ONLY did Ebay sales and typically you can't run a business purely based on that. I can think of 3 or 4 Ebay-only stores who have all closed within the last 2 years from our area.