[Gary]

Interesting to do a percentage calculation on the various categories on eBay UK. As of 21/10/06 out of 22364 items for sale in the various scales listed taking no account of "Other (668)" or "Finescale (187)":-

OO Gauge 71.6%
N Gauge 14.1%
O Gauge 5.7%
HO Gauge 5.5%
G Gauge 1.4%
TT Gauge 0.9%
Z Gauge 0.6%
OO9/HOe 0.2%

Happy modelling
Gary

 

[Gary]

Yes there are "cheaters" who use the OO catagory for HO because they believe OO is a more widely viewed section.

My experiance is that these "cheaters" are making a big mistake as having tested the water I do better with HO product when it is placed in the correct section. I think the continentals will view the British HO section hoping to pick up a bargain and when visiting they ignore the OO section.

The .com eBay is the American site and curently there are 25709 HO items and 612 OO items. You have to view the "Toys and Hobbies" category rather than the "Collectibles" category. The British seem to take an entirely different view of railway models to the rest of the world. Hornby and Bachmann both consider themselves to offer "collectibles" and not "toys" or "hobby" products. The adult collector is almost certainly their biggest customer and British eBay have probably taken this onboard.

Thinking about it considering how massive America is and how big the hobby is said to be there it seems a little odd that eBay America has only about 10% more HO listings than eBay UK has OO listings.

Any ideas why this is?

Happy modelling (or should that be collecting?)
Gary

 

[Gary]

One year on and there are now 16595 items for sale in total in model railways on eBay (deducting finescale and other and catalogues from total as before).

This is a reduction of 24% on this time last year.

OO gauge has performed in line with this.

Now there are 11950 OO items for sale. Last year there were 16012 OO items for sale.

Thats a drop of 25% on last year so interest in OO is remaining consistent.

Other scales look consistent as a percentage too.

So why are fewer items appearaing on eBay than this time last year?

A 25% drop is something serious for eBay. Are sellers using alternative online auctions?

Or is it something else?

Happy modelling
Gary

 

[Gary]

QUOTE I actually dont find e-bay particularly good for deals anyway.

That does not follow the logic of the statistics.

If sellers were getting good prices they would be putting more, not less, on eBay.

You are saying that eBay items go for much higher prices than you are prepared to pay as you never get good deals!

If this was the case then more and more sellers would be using eBay. Not the other way around.

A 25% drop in listings is a BIG drop by any stretch of the imagination!

Happy modelling
Gary

 

[Gary]

The UK eBay catagories are being used. If sellers put OO or 00 in the title is does not matter as they will plonk it in the OO catagory whatever. About 17.5% of the items listed are buy it now. Comparisons are like for like and the listing totals quoted include buy it now.

Buy it now is a useful service as a lot of eBayers don't want to wait for an auction to finish and want it now! Spares for example are one area where buy it now is just perfect. If I want something I do check buy it now prices and if something is on offer at what appears to be a reasonable price I won't wait.

There are several new alternative UK auction sites that do have quanties of railway stuff for sale but because there is no listing fee the items all start at too high a price with most remaining unsold. What is the point of spending time putting a listing together if all you are going to do is price the item at an unatractive level that effectively makes it a "buy it now" anyway! The sellers are living in cloud cuckoo land on some of these alternative sites!

This competition could be part of the reason for the eBay decline.

Happy modelling
Gary

 

[Gary]

UK shipping costs have risen by over 100% for small model railway items over 25mm thick and this type of package did make up the bulk of eBay model rail stuff. There is probably a lot of truth in that. If buyers are taking very high UK shipping costs into account when bidding then there is simply no profit in it for trade sellers so what is the point of using eBay?

That could certainly contribute to eBay volumes being 25% down.

The eBay share price dropped 6% in the last day or two.

Could it be that eBay shareholders are reading this topic...

Swapmeet attendances in the UK are rising strongly so all in all it does seem that the ralway modelling fraternity are rebelling against eBay!

Happy modelling
Gary

 

[Gary]

QUOTE In this country people see model trains as potential goldmines and assume that every piece of model railway equipment found in the loft is worth loads of money just like antique pottery furniture etc. I don't think this is so true elsewhere in the world

Germans might disagree!

Now if you mean by "elsewhere in the world" = America then you may be right.

Consider though that American HO/O stuff is incredibly cheap to start with and historically produced in numbers much much higher than any toy train maker in Europe could ever dream of so the Americans simply are not able to call anything ****RARE****.

Happy modelling
Gary

 

[Gary]

QUOTE Except maybe to trap the unwary, using the word "rare" in a description is a waste of time, - those that really know, know if it's rare or not !

If there is a buyer/seller relationship and many eBay sellers do have a following of buyers then using the word "rare" when appropriate is helpful for the buyer who may be quickly scanning your list of items for sale.

As long as it is used with discretion by responsible sellers.

Its entirely 100% every buyers decision on how they approach eBay and if some choose to ignore items that contain the word "rare" then that is entirely up to them!

Do we avoid Sotherby, Christies, Bonhams and Vectis because of their use of the word "rare"?

Happy modelling
Gary