Nothing riles up online sellers using hosted storefronts more than the two words "fee hikes." When eBay announced upcoming increases to its eBay Stores listing and final value fees, many members protested with lively forum postings and planned strikes.
Bill Cobb, President of eBay North America, announced the new rates, due to take effect Aug. 22, under the headline of "Resetting the Balance of eBay Marketplace." What this basically means is that eBay is looking for a way to offset the growing number of store inventory items as compared to its auction format listings. The result is that disgruntled Web store owners are considering alternatives to the auction giant, though whether or not there is a mass migration remains to be seen. Still, it's worth taking a look at what's available in the marketplace before the new rates are in place next week.
eSales Central - Power Seller Looks Elsewhere
Dave Stoup, a Connecticut-based-eBay Power Seller, has been on eBay for more than six years, and maintained his eBay store, eSales Central periodically over the last four years. To Stoup, the higher fees do make sense if eBay wants to maintain its current business model, focusing on auctions rather than retail sales. On the other hand, he feels eBay purposely reeled in new store merchants in the months leading up to the fee increases.
Consider that while it was putting higher fees in place, eBay created an eBay Stores Resource Center, set up a special campaign for popular store feature Buy It Now and in both May and June ran contest promotions related to eBay Stores.
For Stoup and many other eBay store owners, the most important factor to consider when deciding whether to jump ship is traffic. There's no denying that eBay has the largest market share of auction-minded consumers, and store subscribers know all too well that a couple of auctions running on eBay with cross-promotion links to items listed in their eBay Store can lead to more much more exposure than other services can presently offer.
Stoup told ECommerce-Guide.com that the change in store fees caused him to reassess his online store business. The higher fees mean even less profit on many items obtained through drop-shipping, and consequently, he and his partner and wife, Amy, decided to discontinue their drop-shipping listings. In addition, they expect to further cut costs by downgrading from a featured eBay store at $49.99 per month to the basic $15.95 store.
"I think it's time for me to move on," said Stoup. "We have less items listed in our eBay store, and for now we're going to put items on Wagglepop. We will continue to list more of our book items on Half.com, where we've seen success already. It will take awhile to get listings all moved to Wagglepop, but for a flat fee of $9.95 a month, it is worth a try. Eventually I expect we'll stop running an eBay store completely. I think online sellers really need a viable second choice. eBay just keeps annoying its sellers, and while it won't happen overnight, I believe that eventually we will have a good second choice option."
You Better Shop Around
Most individual sellers (those without a brick-and-mortar store) want the luxury of an easy-to-use storefront that can offer traffic as well as cheap subscription, listing and final value rates. Fortunately, there are other choices out there other than eBay for those looking to set-up hosted Web stores. The issue for most vendors, however, is that many of the competing auction and storefront services just can't match the traffic on eBay. Many merchants, through an eBay Stores discussion forum thread (already deleted by eBay), offered advice and links to eBay alternatives that many were considering using.
Some Web store owners are mulling over a complete switch while others felt playing the field to see where sales went would be a better strategy. In his discussion board post, Stoup was one of several eBay Store sellers who suggested using Wagglepop, while others plan to try listing with Bidville, eCRATER or PriceGrabber, along with making sure the inventory is fed to Froogle to help with exposure as well.
To help sellers who are thinking of moving to greener pastures, we've compiled a summary of some other selling services. Though the following is, of course, not a complete list of alternative solutions to eBay stores, it is a good place to start if you have a smaller volume of monthly sales and the need for cheaper subscriptions and fees than what eBay and some of the bigger, more well-known stores offer. If you are presently still investigating all the options for hosted storefronts, we also suggest that you start by taking a look at our recent feature, Starting Your Own E-Business : Choosing a Platform which provides details on several hosted storefront platforms including Yahoo! Stores, ProStores and others.
A Round-up of Storefronts: Features, Fees and Services Compared
eBay Store
eBay Stores are used by dedicated eBay sellers to help maximize their online business. With a Store, sellers can display all their listings (regardless of format) in one location at a unique URL. They can customize the store's look, create and organize items in categories and sub-categories, set cross-promotional items, obtain traffic reports and also gain exposure for their store on eBay Stores pages on eBay.com and eBay.ca.
Basic Store subscriptions start at $15.95 per month. Each item listed in a store (after Aug. 22, 2006) is charged a listing fee of $0.05 to $0.10, and closing value fees will start at 10 percent for less than $25 in final value on a sliding scale from there. (Final value fees are based on 10 percent of the initial $25, plus 7 percent of $25.01 to $100 plus 5 percent from $100.01 to $1,000.00 and 3 percent on $1,000.01 and higher). eBay Stores also offer image hosting. The first image is free, with additional images costing $0.15 each. eBay also offers slideshows, galleries, image packs and super-sized pictures for additional fees.
PriceGrabber Storefronts
PriceGrabber is another consumer-to-consumer hosted storefront, allowing individuals and even businesses to sell online without having their own Web site. Adding simplicity to the whole process, PriceGrabber does not charge per item or listing fees. Instead, all items sold through PriceGrabber incur a standard $1 + 4.75 percent, after the product is sold. This commission fee is based on the purchase price (including shipping and handling charges). Additional fees that may be incurred by the seller include those for including images.
The first photo is free and additional images cost15 cents. Sellers may opt to purchase an image pack for $1, which allows them to use up to six images. To super-size all images the fee is 75 cents. With PriceGrabber's claim of 11,000 merchants and sellers, 21 million unique shoppers and 'lower than eBay' fees, it is an attractive choice for individual and business sellers.
eCRATER
eCRATER boasts that it is a completely free online marketplace. They require no storefront subscription fee, offer free listings and also do not charge a final value fee. So, basically they do deliver on the promise. Dimitar Slavov, eCRATER's founder, told ECommerce-Guide they have no plans to introduce any fees for this service, however sellers can opt to pay for premium advertising.
Premium advertising on eCRATER, for example, would mean paying to include your item(s) as the first listed item in any category, among other services. Premium advertising on the Web site is completely optional to the seller. eCRATER is a relatively new online marketplace but in just over half a year they have 7,000 registered members and 2 million page views (unique and reloads) per month. eCRATER offers PayPal and Google Checkout for payment services and while it is presently designed for the U.S. marketplace, Slavov expects to expand abroad in the future.
Bidville
Recently acquired by uBid, Bidville is also a popular choice for online auctions and storefronts. It offers auction-style listings as well as different levels of storefront services. Subscriptions are based on three, six or 12 months of service. Basic stores start at $14.95. You don't pay an insertion fee, but final sale fees (FSF) are 5 percent up to $25, plus 2.5 percent from $425 to $1000, and an additional 1 percent over $1,000. By upgrading to a featured store ($29.95 for three months), you will not pay any additional fees, including FSF. BidVille claims about 900,000 members and millions of daily listings in more than 7,200 categories.
Wagglepop Stores
Wagglepop launched last February with much fanfare, but quickly the Web site was shut down by its creator leaving sellers and buyers in the lurch. Now Wagglepop is back on the scene, but its shaky history may leave prospective sellers at the door without subscribing. For those not afraid of losing their $9.95 and time invested in setup should the site head south again, Wagglepop is back online with its eBay-like look and feel. They now offer a storefront for a $9.95 monthly fee. This subscription includes a storefront, free listings, which are included in the thumbnail gallery, and Buy it Now services. Wagglepop breaks down its final value fees more so than others, providing lower fees (see fee chart) for those turning over small value items. A quick count on their auction category page shows almost 20,000 items listed.
| Example Store Inventory & Associated Costs |
eBay Store (Basic) |
PriceGrabber Storefront |
eCRATER Store |
Bidville Storefront (Basic) |
Wagglepop Store |
|
Subscription Fee |
$15.00 per month |
N/A |
Free |
$14.95 per 3 month subscription |
$9.95 / Month |
Item Sell Value: $25.00
Item S&H Value: $6.00
Image Requirements: 1 |
$0.05 per item listing
+ 10% of the sale
first image free |
$1 + 4.75%
(Close value + S&H)
first image free |
Free |
5% of final value sale first image free |
Minimum final
value fee $0.75
first image free |
Item Sell Value: $125.00
Item S&H Value: $18.00
Image Requirements: 2 |
$0.05 per item listing
+ 10% of initial $25
+ 7% of $25.01 to $100
+ 5% of remaining
Image 1: free
Images 2: $0.15 each |
$1 + 4.75%
(Close value + S&H)
first image free
Image 1: free
Images 2: $0.15 each |
Free |
5% of $25
+ plus 2.5% of the remaining $100.
first image free |
Minimum final
value fee $3.00
first image free |
| Alexa Traffic Ranking |
10 |
373 |
45,505 |
25,255 |
175,743 |
Vangie Beal is a frequent contributor to ECommerceGuide. She is also the managing editor of Webopedia.
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