Rob & Melissa Stephenson from Flea Market Flipper talk about why they've only had one return in the last two years of their reselling business.
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Reseller Hangout Podcast - How And Why We Have Only Had 1 Return In The Last 2 Years
Rob: What's up, ProFlippers? In today's episode, we are talking about how and why we have only had one return in the last two years.
Rob: All right guys, so we are excited to talk about how and why we've only had one return in the last two years.
Melissa: And we need to preface it by saying returns will happen in your business. They went get one tomorrow. Like it, it could happen anytime. Yeah. But for the last two years, we have only had to complete one return and we've done done some things to help minimize the the ability, or I don't know the, what's the word I'm looking for?
Rob: We wanna help you do the same thing. So how we've set up our business throughout the last 20 some years. That's what we're trying to teach you guys how to do. So you can minimize those returns. Nobody likes a return. Yeah. Nobody wants to get that email.
It says, hey, I want to, I, I wanna return this. That's one of those things that we wanna help you out with how we do it, so hopefully it will help you set up your business the same way.
Melissa: And so we've had four open cases in the last two years, and three of them we won. And one of them ended up being a return.
The one, the return that we did take was completely your fault. So he happily took, not happily, nobody likes returns, but you took the return. It's not that.
Rob: I will add that it was the cheapest out of all four. So that was the one that I wasn't fighting. I probably could have fought for it, but like I said, it was really a problem in my listing.
I, I should have done better to not have the return. And that's one of those things that I'll take the blame. It was a $250, $200, I don't remember exactly what it was, but a $200 issue that I ended up taking it back selling it and making the money right back fairly quickly. So it wasn't a huge ordeal.
Melissa: Yeah, so the other cases that were open were things where somebody had altered an item. So that's one thing that, you know, people tell us we don't accept returns on our, in our listings and our items, and we'll get the comment all the time. Well, people can, you know, still get a return. eBay will force the return if it comes to that or whatever, and yes and no. Of course they can. There are things that they can, but there are other ways to get around it and have the, eBay is the middle man. eBay is trying to decide who is in the right here.
Rob: So they're gonna look two stories, actually three stories to every single instance. Yes. And the, the, the truth.
And then you have my side and the other person's side, the buyer side and the seller side and the truth. And that's one of those things that eBay's just trying to mitigate it or trying mediate, the actual, the sale that went through. So, yeah. That's the biggest thing. And they're healing, hearing two things from two different people.
That's the biggest thing you have to realize.
Melissa: I think one, just to give an example, like one of 'em, something fell off. They, while they were taking it off, they took it off and it fell and it broke one of the feet off, and they tried to say it was broken already. Yeah. Whenever they got it. And he's like, look, those aren't even my straps on that thing.
So you dropped it somehow? I'm sorry, what can I, you know, I can't, yeah, I can't be responsible for you taking it off the trailer or whatever.
Rob: That actually wasn't a return request. That was just somebody reaching back out. Oh, that wasn't, and they said it was damaged when they got it. Okay. So it wasn't something that went through eBay.
They just reached out and said, hey, this thing is damaged. The leg's broken. And we would like a partial refund. But like Melissa said, we could see they put different straps on it. I knew from the guy from communication before he got it shipped that he didn't want to have a forklift. He was gonna lift it up off the pallet, and I'm pretty sure they didn't know how heavy it was.
They lifted it up, they dropped it and bent one of the legs on the thing and he was trying to get me to pay for it. So as soon as I wrote back and said, yeah, I can see those aren't my straps. Somebody's already moved it around and that kind of stuff, then he didn't even respond back to it. So, that's the other thing is just knowing how you're handling, how you're communicating with people is huge.
Is a big, big thing, not just getting upset when somebody asks for a return and not jumping in and giving them the return or a partial refund or anything like that. You really have to dig in and figure out what's going on at this one. Like I said, he sent me a picture of it to try and say it was damaged and I could see they actually put it on a different pallet.
They put different straps on it, so they had altered it from the original shipping that they received. So, yeah.
Melissa: So I didn't realize they didn't open a, a case on it.
Rob: No, they didn't. They just reached out and said it. So they just reach out. Some of the other cases or some, the, the other ones that we had, they actually opened it through eBay and we had to actually communicate through eBay.
Through eBay, yeah. While we were going through the process.
Melissa: One, one was an altered, they altered the item and the other one he blew a fuse, I think when he plugged it in or he plugged it in. We've had that happen in our group too. It's like some people will plug in something and it blows something and that really is not your responsibility.
So as long as you keep that communication Yeah, with the buyer, there are ways you can figure it out. Everything you can figure out. Yeah. Like you, you, there's always a way. To get past it, so.
Rob: Yep. And that's what you have to remember. You gotta dig. You have to really be a investigator when you're trying to deal with these.
Don't just go with the first thing that happens, get upset about it. Nobody likes this to happen to 'em, but you still really need to dig and get to the truth of what's going on with the item.
Melissa: Yeah. So, so I'd say I'd be a detective and don't just, you know, jump the gun if they message you, you know, you can't freak out, you can't panic.
You have to just go and, you know, look at all the thing, ask the questions, say, okay, well what happened like, is the item damage in shipping? Because that is most often when something happens, our returns, if we get a return request, it's gonna be damaged in shipping. Why can't I talk?
Rob: Yeah, damaged in shipping.
Melissa: Yeah. Shipping damage claim. Yeah. So, and then we get paid out through the shipping company.
Rob: So nobody loses.
Melissa: They get paid out. Yeah. Except for they don't have their item, which stinks, you know, they wanted the item, but every, nobody loses any money. So in that respect, then it's fine. And that's what most of our returns, if we get a return, it's usually a damage claim.
Yeah. And then we just go through those processes and have to talk through that, so. Yep.
Rob: Yeah. So what can you do in your business to help on returns?
Melissa: Reducing the amount of returns that you have.
Rob: Exactly. So the first thing that we want to talk about is absolutely, and we, we preach this left and right around here is under promise and over-deliver on every single thing that you sell.
Yeah. Make sure that buyer has the proper expectations of the item that they're getting. You have to remember, this is not an exchange of me giving you money. You looking at the item, looking it over, making sure there's no issues with it. And then I taking the item so I inspect it before, that's not the case with this.
They are going off of my pictures when I'm selling something, my description, everything is done without them physically seeing the item. So you definitely want to be under promising and over-delivering, and that's just setting the proper expectations for the sale, before it even goes through.
Melissa: And make sure you take pictures of all imperfections.
Anything that you could possibly notice, a, a color miscoloring of something, a scratch or a dent or just anything that you can think of that you can see. Try to use all your pictures so the buyer can really see it. And I know a lot of times you're like, oh, well I don't really want them to see it because it's not.
It might not sell cause it's not in perfect condition. Well, if they get it afterwards and they see that once it arrives, you're in big trouble. That's not gonna be good. It's sold, but then you're gonna end up getting a return. So you used to back in the day, say mint condition. Yep. Is an awesome item. Now we stay away from those words completely.
Rob: Because that's what salespeople do.
They're trying to over inflate what the item actually is, or trying to say, it's an amazing item. You, you know, this is the item you need, don't miss out on this. It's one of those things that you overpromise and underdeliver on it. Now we've swapped it and that's what we wanna always underpromise and overdeliver.
That way when the buyer gets it, they're very, very excited for the item. They're very, very appreciative that it's in better condition than you actually listed it for. So, and you had, that's the biggest thing is under.
Melissa: You had a $1,700 return on a Nordic track. Yeah. Back in the day, a long time ago.
Because you said it was pristine, mint condition and the guy got it and said, yeah, this is not that. So he wasn't very happy and he, that's a big, you know, that's a big chunk. So anyway.
Rob: Yeah, huge. So that's the first thing you can do. Make sure you are under promising and over-delivering on your item. What is number two?
Melissa: I wanted to add one more thing. Can I add one more thing? Oh, sorry. Yeah, sorry. In the descriptions too, make sure that you are accurately describing everything. So. Very important, very important in the descriptions and like to the point where sometimes our descriptions are, you almost say, turn people off from the item.
Like, I'd rather than get an item in better condition than they thought they were buying than them get it in worse condition. So I just wanted add that in the description. So.
Rob: Yeah, no, it's very important. And even if you take a picture of the imperfection, the scratch, whatever it is, if you do not put it into the description, somebody might not really even see the scratch or the dent or whatever it is.
So you definitely want to put, make sure your pictures show it, and you also have it in the description so people can see two places that there is something with the item. Plus, if it ever goes to eBay for mediation or anything like that, then you show, hey, I have a picture of it in my listing.
I have it in my description so you can back yourself with what you've actually done. Yeah, so.
Melissa: All right, so number two is not, it's a little bit different. It's not like something you can necessarily do, but it's at like right now, maybe you can, but, it's the way we set up our business model. So, because we sell some of the bigger ticket items and the higher profit, higher, larger value items, those tend to attract the customers that are easier to work with. So somebody who's gonna go and spend a thousand dollars, spend $2,000 with you is gonna look at the item. They're gonna read everything. They're gonna communicate with you if they need to communicate with you, and then they're gonna make the purchase versus nitpicking and most be more likely to do a return.
Rob: So, absolutely.
So this customer typically, who we're selling we're se selling commercial items just because the higher retail value on those, we can get more money for 'em.
It's, you guys know we sell high profit items, so, that customer typically runs a business, they're getting our items for probably 50%, even sometimes the less than 50% off a. They're appreciative for that item. When they get it, if we're properly, portraying the item, if we're properly, taking pictures of the item, and disclosing everything into the description, that's one of those things that they'll be happy with it.
So you really attract a better quality customer. It really is. It's a better quality customer for that item.
Melissa: I would say like if you've been reselling at any, whoever's watching this, like at any point you've been reselling for any amount of time, you start to see the people that you know you don't wanna sell to, they will start asking questions like, questions are good.
We want people like, and we sell higher things. So like people, they have a couple questions, that's fine. But you can start to see the pattern of people who ask all these different questions about the item and then try to dicker down on the price or like.
Rob: Nope, I don't want this customer.
Melissa: You can start to read them really good once you've been in the business for a little while.
So then you'll be like, okay, it's not even worth the sale at this point. Like, you just want, like you need a different customer. Yeah. So, and every time, not every time, but a high percentage of the time, once the item sells, it's gonna be a return anyways. Yep. So you can, you start to read those in a lot of the different conversations.
Rob: Yep. So when you do raise your higher value items that you are selling, you do attract a higher value customer.
Melissa: Yeah, you do attract a higher value customer. So like we get a comment a lot on social media, you know, well expect a thousand dollars return, expect a $2,000 return, and I mean, yes, and they could happen any day, something could happen, whatever.
Like we know that. So that another key thing is to have a reserve of money padding away so that if you do get a big return, you can handle it. So that is definitely a good business practice to not, you know, spend everything that absolutely comes in. Absolutely. Keep a little padding. But they are a lot less likely because the person buying it needs that item.
They want it, they need it, and they, as long as everything works, they get it, they're gonna be happy with it. Absolutely. They're not in it to scam you and waste your time.
Rob: No. So, and you can try it out. They're not trying something out to see if it actually. They need that item, they need it immediately. And that's one of those things, when you provide it to 'em, you give them, it's shipped to them, all that kind of stuff. They're gonna be appreciative for the item, especially when you're under promising and over-delivering.
Melissa: So we've even noticed in our members group too, so we've had a couple people that have sold higher stuff and they had an issue like a burner wouldn't turn on or something like with electrical and the buyer is just so much more like, okay, well let's see if, let's test this out. Let's see if this'll work. And they're just so much easier to communicate with. Yeah, typically.
Rob: So well put yourself in the, the shoes of a buyer who's buying something like this. Even if you put it into a car, you're getting a $25,000 car for $10,000.
Are you gonna be like, hey, I want my, my money back on this car because the door handle breaks or something like that? No, it's not one of those things. You want to try and figure out how you can keep the item no matter what it is. Even if something does not, it's not the way that you expect it or something happened.
When the buyer gets these items, typically it's 50% or more off of retail, and their only other option is to go buy it on. So, which is really, really cool. You have to remember that, you're, you are attracting a higher quality buyer, when you start selling higher profit items, for sure.
So, yeah.
Melissa: So that was our, those are our well number three.
Rob: Oh, what, what was number three? Did you miss number three?
Melissa: Yeah.
Rob: Oh, cool. So number three.
Melissa: I forgot.
Rob: Our business model is a low volume, high profit. So when you think about it, if you can switch over to a low volume, high profit business model, you're dealing with less sales.
Like last year we probably had 70 some sales. I don't remember exactly what it is. Melissa might know the number. Do you know the number?
Melissa: I forget the tally. It was, it was just close to 70.
Rob: Yeah. So say 60 to a hundred sales in a year. Most people who are selling on eBay, people who are doing this full-time, they're doing thousands of sales in a month, hundreds of sales in a week.
When you are thinking about all those sales that you're actually having to do to make that money, you have a lot more customers in there that have the potential to go south. For us, 70, I love it 70 to a hundred sales. It's beautiful. We're not dealing with tons and tons of people that the sale could go south.
So, the business model that we've chosen, really, really works well for this as well. So, out of, and I don't know what the average is for the last two years, we probably did roughly 70 the year before. Yeah. So you're talking about a hundred? Yeah. Roughly 140 sales, and to have, what was it you said?
Four sale, four return requests, and only have one go through. I mean, those odds are awesome. That's, that's just awesome. And that's probably similar to somebody who sells high volume. Maybe it's not. Maybe because that's still, you're talking about.
Melissa: Just a completely different business model.
Rob: It is. It's, but it's cool. And like I said, it's cool, it's a cool model because you are dealing with less people. Typically you will deal when you're listing the stuff the proper way when you're under promising over delivering, you will have less return requests for sure.
Melissa: Yeah. And that was a, we haven't done even dove into our numbers yet from last year completely. Like we have our rough estimate, but we haven't, finished tallying everything out. Cause we wanted to still do an end of the year review.
Rob: Yeah. We need to.
Melissa: Which, which, yeah, we were close to like, it was a little over 70, thousand for those. Okay. 60 to 70 items. So I have to double check cause I was looking at both years, and, and checking 'em off.
Cool. So yeah, so I, I think our average sale price last. $1,200.
Rob: $1,200 per, per item.
Melissa: The year before it was $1,400.
Rob: Just gives you an idea of the type of items that we're selling. So, yeah. Yeah. Sweet.
Melissa: Just to throw that in there.
Rob: That's it. So cool. If you guys wanna learn more, where can they go if they wanna learn more?
Melissa: We have a five mistakes that resellers make. If you wanna check it out, it's a intro course. It's freeflippingcourse.com. You can check out those mistakes so you don't make them, hopefully they'll help you get started and get started on the right foot.
Rob: Guys, we totally appreciate you guys. We appreciate you guys listening to some of these tips.
Hopefully you can implement them in your business and really see some sort of results. You guys rock. We will see you on the next episode.