It's a buyers market (or why ebay sucks)

I mentioned it in another post awhile ago, but it's probably worth repeating that in addition to buying clothes for myself, I sometimes find stuff on the cheap that I re-sell (which I then use to fund my own clothing purchases).

While I have occasionally bought new clothes (mainly a couple pairs of jeans and athletic shoes), the vast majority (95% or so) of my entire wardrobe has come from thrift stores over the course of the past decade or so. To be honest, I enjoy the thrill of the hunt, and I must admit that I actually find myself largely disgusted by the cost of purchasing clothing new.

I'm getting a little off track here, so I'm going to swerve back on course by simply saying that it seems like ebay has finally run off the rails. Sure, it's good for popping off certain super-rare items, but a good portion of the traffic on the site seems to simply be other sellers trying to figure out what will sell high. This is probably nothing new to those who have been using the site extensively for the past several years, but it was nonetheless a bit of a surprise to me.

Let me present example one; a vintage western suit made of shiny polyester. This was not a high-end item by any means, but at the time of auction closing, the auction had been viewed over 225 times and was being watched by over 20 people. The pictures I posted weren't too shabby (at least in my humble opinion).



In the end, this suit got a whopping 3 bids and went for a grand total of $15.50. Fortunately, it was something I'd purchased for $1 and didn't spend too much time photographing, but I certainly found myself frustrated.

My next dose of reality was with a swank 3-piece 100% wool Daks suit, tailored in London. I certainly didn't expect it to go for $200 or anything like that, but I again felt like I had taken pretty good pictures (like the western suit, it was too small for me, otherwise I likely would have kept it) and described it well. At auction closing, it had over 100 page views and 10 watchers.



Bam! It went for $38, which obviously isn't scraping the barrel, but considering it was a reasonable size (40), it felt like it certainly didn't bring as much as it should have.

And so, I may have reached my wits end with ebay for interesting clothing items. Is it time to dive into the world of Etsy for my vintage scores that don't fit me, or is there something else I'm missing?

At least my clothing budget is low. That 38 dollar sale mentioned above will buy me about 10 times more than the average person.