It's quiet......

Too quiet!!!!!
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  • 39 Comments sorted by Votes Date Added
  • Sorry, I have John and Ron tied up in my basement.
  • If you think THIS is quiet, you should see the disappointing HipComic Forums -- no new entries since August 9th! :neutral:
  • My inventory is starting to grow moss.
  • John, try humidity control. ><
  • I thought I was doing that by storing them in my wife's greenhouse.
  • edited October 2022 1 LikesVote Down
    I was planning to spend this windy/rainy day in my stamp den working on an APS circuit I received yesterday and playing with my collections. This morning I opened up my email and found a couple of HipStamp sales. The number of items sold always lies below the limit of my screen, so I always scroll down really slowly, kinda like trying to squeeze the last card into the one I need to make that full house.
    The first one squeezed down and I found an order for three items, all early French position pairs and blocks. Easy enough...so far so good.
    The second order, as I scrolled (squeezed) down was for (count 'em) 91 lots ! Awesome ! (except my circuit book will have to wait). This is almost a whole day affair...sigh....
  • Never fails!
  • Sale were going along nicely and then all of a sudden they hit the wall. Wham!!! Sales right now are almost non-existent.
  • i think inflation has caught up now to stamp collecting. I was even running a sale withh a promo code to my "regular" buyers and it hardly generated any sales the last few weeks. This is the slowest it has been in quite some time for me.
  • It is very, very slow. Never since the Bidstart days, except when I started and didn't have much listed, I had less than one order a day. With HipStamp is gradually grew to 2 sales a day, some with 60/100 items. Which Codid, it grew to 3 orders a days but somewhat smaller, 20 to 60 items. Now, since last May it collapsed to ONE in every 3 days! And usually, only one item.
    Three things happened, yes: Inflation but I really don't believe its the most important.
    Second, I "lost" 7,000 listings because of technical problem when changing my credit card. Thanks for the "easy to use" HipStamp system!
    But first, I think the HipValue feature really doesn't help. I've checked several and its ridiculous to compare items sold for 0,01 on a bid item, or poor copies or the dozens of items with no pics! I may be wrong but a customer will just keep looking for the dealer that sells anything "common" for 0,05. A collector who needs to fill a hole in his collection will spend a fair price...not the catalogue price but even then. Which catalogue, some items are listed on Scott for 0,25 and sometimes much higher in Yvert or SG or the other way around. So now thanks to HipStamp new feature it seems it has to be the lowest possible.
  • I've been on a listing spree the last two weeks from auctions I won. Added over 110 new listings, mostly Canada. Since then I've a whopping total of 3 views and 1sale. I'm not even half way through the won auctions, but I'll likely halt adding additional so as not to duplicate more than a few listings. Could be waiting a long time at my recent pace. How are others faring? Is Canada not in favor by collectors for some reason?
  • Let me add that the stupid pop-up is probably driving people away also.
    The Hip values are also a problem and do not need to belong here but I think that it was put on to help the one cent auctions get sold and they are not getting many bids any way.
  • Well...Bentley the Cat has had a pretty good month in spite of his incessant laziness and constant naps. On track for at least the second best month of 2022. Per item average up to around $7.80. I'll go ahead and say it...quality over quantity is Bentley's M.O. The cat will never be able to retire doing this and I won't either but it is a grind (a fun one though).

    Bill...on the pop ups...use a browser, app, or plug-in that can control it. Please keep that issue on your original rant post. Nice try to hijack this thread though.

    And the HipValues issue has been beaten to a dead horse so much that I just got my boots re-soled with the poor horse's hide. Ain't going away and, to an even marginally knowledgeable potential customer, is mostly an immaterial piece of information.

    John...keep grinding and keep listing..holiday season is nigh and folks will be looking for nice stamps as gifts for their stamp collector friends and family.

  • I'm a little disappointed in the trend I see here on Hip Stamp. Sales are more than adequate for me (a collector who sells duplicates to buy more stamps). Over the last month I had a lot of time and went on a listing frenzy. I usually carry 200-300 listings but I am now at 400-500. So when I got the email for an upcoming "Halloween Sale" I said "Why Not." I signed up offering a 20% store wide discount. I got an email saying I was ready to go and sure enough everything is up and running this morning (1st day of sale). Here's my disappointment - I've seen no promotion what-so-ever about this sale event anywhere on the website- neither leading up to the sale or now that it is started. I do see promotions for auction events sponsored by bigger sellers all the time (and now). My whole reason for taking part in this sale was to broaden my selling "footprint" and gain some exposure and customers. I expect to have some decent sales but am disappointed in the way this sales event has been handled by Hip Stamp- so far anyway!
  • Greg,
    It looks like they finally fixed the pop-up problem.

    Yes it is slow on here but it is also slow on eBay. A lot of deals out there to be had in the auctions.

    People are short on money so it will be like this for a while like it was in the late '70's. The best thing to do is to keep listing. The more you have to list the more opportunities to sell.
  • Ok good on the pop up thing. Now we can move on to....stamp things!!!

    I don't know....I've had my second best month ever this October. The odd thing is...a lot fewer items but folks are buying much higher priced items. Maybe it's that the folks that are getting hit harder by the tough economy are the folks who were buying low priced items and the folks who have more wherewithal are not as affected. Just a thought.
  • Bill....how was it fixed? I still get it. Does every looker at our site get this stupid pop up/ And does it only come up once for those browsing?
  • I’m always looking for deals ( who isn’t ?)… starting to plan for my store … noticed pricing is dropping , higher priced items are taking longer to sell … the market is just a doing as expected in a time of inflation and economic uncertainty .
  • "… the market is just a doing as expected in a time of inflation and economic uncertainty ."
    You wouldn't know it by what's going on in the live auction world. First Harmer's and now Sparks, I've been getting my po-po handed to me every day. Bidding is hot and heavy, and several of the lots I was interested in and bid on went 4x estimate (so I let them go)...
  • Yes, the higher end stuff is always wild, but I found some real deals recently, especially in older US stuff ( plate blocks).. I'm holding on a bit and stuff I really want is now slipping down into my line of sight. download
  • John

    I don't know but it is gone.
  • Rene,
    That's a mighty fine 122 you have there. Is it a wish, or is this something you have for your upcoming store?
    My suggestion is:
    Get your store up as fast as possible, with about 600 items in the $20 - $100 range. This material is moving fast at the moment. Sprinkle in about 50 high value items. You can just skip the low-value stuff for now.
  • I agree with Scott completely. Really good strategy especially just starting out. Better quality will attract more serious customers than a bunch of minimum value stuff. There is too much of that out there already.
  • Phil, are you going all Marine on me again?
  • Oooh, Scott. Jarheads say "hoo-rah!" Army rats say "hua." And what is the difference in the two services? Soldiers take ground, Marines take casualties....
  • And USAF says "Hell Yeah". (We prefer to speak in whole words). ;)
    I'd always heard it as "Amy takes ground, Marines take bullets", but then I never saw the point of making such distinctions. When the metal starts to fly, we're all in the same soup.
  • Phil, I thought you were a Greek fisherman in your past life.
  • 20221030_182839
    "The past is never dead. It's not even past."

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