When you ramp up and start putting thousands (or tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands) of items for sale on eBay, the question naturally arises: Where are you going to store all this stuff? If you don’t ask the question, your spouse or your children surely will. There are two different solutions to this problem, and Kevin Harmon uses both of them. “I started my office in my house. I had one bookshelf that held 200 DVDs, and I remember at that time, I was freaking out with how many DVDs I had. (Now I have 200,000.) When I ran out of space, I moved to an 800-sq. ft. office. Then, I moved to the office next door and took over both spaces. Now we’re in a 2,000-sq. ft. warehouse, and we’re moving to a new space.” The key to such growth is having lots of merchandise to sell, and that, of course, depends on finding the right suppliers. “Through our distributors we can offer as many as 300,000 items,” says Harmon. “There’s a whole lot we could offer; it’s just a matter of finding what sells on eBay.”
Finding what sells requires research in eBay’s completed auctions, which Harmon conducts on a regular basis. It’s also a matter of pricing lower than the competition. In the case of CDs and DVDs, Harmon knows he’s competing with the many brick-and-mortar stores that sell movies and music. He realizes that the only reasons someone would make a purchase on eBay are price and selection: He has to offer items at a lower price than the competition, and he has to offer unusual, even strange items that people can’t find easily, such as the movie shown in “Ninety percent of our items are more expensive than a brick and mortar store. Someone could indeed buy a DVD for $16 in a physical, retail store and they would pay $21 through me if you include shipping. I’m taking advantage of the laziness of the world. The average big-box store like Best Buy has 2,000 titles. We have 200,000 titles including many unique, rare movies. You have limited movie selections in the local store, so you go online.
My business works because I found a lot of products to buy the right type of products. eBay is a site where you have to sell at competitive wholesale pricing, and then you just offer everything under the sun.” The Inflatable Madness LLC business model doesn’t require Harmon to store every one of the items he sells in his warehouse, however. Like many eBay PowerSellers, he uses drop-shippers: suppliers who sell merchandise and hold on to it for the owner; when a purchase is made, they pack and ship it as part of their services. The eBay seller never actually sees them. “Our business model is two fold virtual inventory we don’t own until it’s sold, then national distributors.”
Finding what sells requires research in eBay’s completed auctions, which Harmon conducts on a regular basis. It’s also a matter of pricing lower than the competition. In the case of CDs and DVDs, Harmon knows he’s competing with the many brick-and-mortar stores that sell movies and music. He realizes that the only reasons someone would make a purchase on eBay are price and selection: He has to offer items at a lower price than the competition, and he has to offer unusual, even strange items that people can’t find easily, such as the movie shown in “Ninety percent of our items are more expensive than a brick and mortar store. Someone could indeed buy a DVD for $16 in a physical, retail store and they would pay $21 through me if you include shipping. I’m taking advantage of the laziness of the world. The average big-box store like Best Buy has 2,000 titles. We have 200,000 titles including many unique, rare movies. You have limited movie selections in the local store, so you go online.
My business works because I found a lot of products to buy the right type of products. eBay is a site where you have to sell at competitive wholesale pricing, and then you just offer everything under the sun.” The Inflatable Madness LLC business model doesn’t require Harmon to store every one of the items he sells in his warehouse, however. Like many eBay PowerSellers, he uses drop-shippers: suppliers who sell merchandise and hold on to it for the owner; when a purchase is made, they pack and ship it as part of their services. The eBay seller never actually sees them. “Our business model is two fold virtual inventory we don’t own until it’s sold, then national distributors.”
