Listing your products on eBay or Amazon is a no-risk way to get extra sales, get the right price for rare or unique products, shift underperforming lines and sell unwanted stock.

In this month’s Talking Shop, Gems Gifts explains how selling toys on Amazon Marketplace has helped bolster its trade and ease the pressure of the recession.
There are plenty of options for independent retailers looking to go online, but setting up your own venture might not be the most convenient option.

“Launching your own website can be very expensive and can take many man hours and huge costs to maintain and update,” says Kavan Webb, sales director at internet retailer Treasure Island Toys.

Although Webb admits eCommerce packages, such as Magento and Prestashop make the process a lot easier, launching your own site introduces many challenges, such as finding and paying for hosting, setting up terms and conditions – and that’s before you even think about finding your own customers.

With online selling platforms, all of the legwork is done for you. eBay and the Amazon Marketplace are the most common options and will introduce your wares to the two biggest consumer bases on the web. But with that level of exposure comes intense competition.

Webb explains the main differences between the two: “Amazon is completely price driven as all Marketplace sellers appear as just a name and a price, so the buyer usually just goes for whoever has the lowest price.

“eBay is also very price driven, but there are more opportunities to allow your brand to shine and encourage buyers to go with you over others. For instance, you have a whole page for each product, which you can style to match your branding.”

While eBay does indeed allow sellers to put more personality into their listings, the Amazon Marketplace style is generally quicker and more convenient. All Marketplace listings are incorporated into Amazon’s regular product pages, so there is no need to spend time typing up product descriptions or taking photos – all the hard work has already been done for you. Adding a product is as simple as entering the EAN barcode number and setting your price.

Anecdotally, retailers report that Amazon buyers generally pay a higher price for the same product.
Midco Toys is one retailer which has had great success selling toys via these online markets. Boasting three bricks and mortar shops in Derbyshire and Staffordshire, Midco owner David Middleton started his business selling on toys on eBay. Today, the firm has an entire warehouse dedicated to packing orders received via internet selling platforms.

“We sell literally hundreds of thousands of toys using various platforms throughout the year,” explains Middleton. “Our business model is simply to be on the ball, look at what’s available and try to offer something different. There are a lot of people online trying to sell the same item to the same customers – this is all well and good if you can buy at a better price. But 30 people trying to compete on the same item is just going to create a price war and that is not good for business.

“The key is to be versatile and offer different products or more niche, specific items. Why compete with these sellers who set their prices so low? Find something different and move onto the next product or craze.”

Middleton also thinks having a physical store could give a crucial advantage over internet-only retailers: “If you have your own stores in high-volume footfall areas you get a feel for what people are looking for. This is something you can’t get from online – people do not email and ask questions about lines you don’t stock.”

Aside from product selection, Middleton says that good pictures, descriptions, feedback and reputation “are all critical things” when selling in this environment.

To ensure repeat business on eBay Midco spares no expense when it comes to customer service, offering the fastest available shipping and making sure the warehouse is manned 24 hours a day, so someone is always available to respond to customer emails and calls.

If a stubborn line still refuses to sell after heavy discounting then you can usually find a home for it online.

“Because you are appearing in front of such a large customer base, there is going to be someone somewhere who will want that product. There have been lines we have struggled with in the shops which we have been able to clear online in days.”

Supplier options

How start-up toy companies can also benefit from open online markets.

Carddies is an arts and crafts product co-developed by two mums – Esther Winter and Raquel Bello. Having booked their stands for Toy Fair and Top Drawer, the pair thought it would be advantageous to go into the shows with some sales history behind them.

Winter says: “Rather than set up a purchasing function on the Carddies website, which would be costly and also initially limited in scope, we decided that the best thing to do would be to link our product page to Amazon.”

They decided on the Amazon Fulfilment programme where, for a percentage of the sales, Amazon takes the product into its own warehouse and packs and ships it.
Best of all, the product page looks just like any other product selling on Amazon, so to the customer there’s no difference.

“We were able to offer an almost immediate selling channel with not much effort or cost,” explains Winter.
“It allowed us to get Carddies known to consumers before launching properly at Toy Fair and Top Drawer.

“It has given us the confidence that the product will be of interest to retailers. In the seven weeks since listing them we’ve had lots of sales and wonderful feedback from consumers.”

www.carddies.com

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