Hi! Happy Sunday!
We have a lot of new things in store for you on our blog over the coming weeks. We’re changing it up to focus even more on helping you Buy Right and Sell Right to dress your kids for less.
One of our new ideas is to ask our Seller’s to share tips on how they buy right and sell right. The first we pose a question to is one you have probably already noticed is jabemt, She has posted over 1,500 listings on LoobaLee since April (ALL Gymboree) and she sells multiple items almost daily. (Click here to shop jabemt’s LoobaLee Store)
Even we were amazed at the listing volume, after all, even myself (“Suzanne”) as founder of the site have only posted ~500 listings.. But, I have been successful there too, having reached over $1,000 in sales on the site over about a 9 month period.
So… we are highly curious and have lots of questions we want to ask jabemt, and it gave us the idea reaching out to our sellers and asking them to share their buying and sellings tips, advice, and strategies. Now… some of this is considered ‘competitive’ information to Seller’s who run their listings more like a business, but most can offer just basic advice to help us Moms be more savvy when it comes to saving money and staying organized.
Our first question to Jabemt is about just that… what helps her stay organized? When you are selling kids clothing on-line, you need to keep your virtual inventory of listings in synch with your physical inventory. This can be especially challenging when you have a lot of it!
LoobaLee: “How do you keep track of all that inventory?”
jabemt: “I created a spread sheet on my computer to keep track of everything. I group it into the [Gymboree] lines and have sub-categories for socks, baby girl, kid girl, boy, and baby boy. I write down what it is (shirt, pants, PJs), a short description (ie. Pink leopard), the Sku #, date it came out, size, price it is worth, price I paid (tax included), and price I want to get for it. This helps me keep track of everything I have and I do know exactly what I paid for items. I never list an item online unless it has been entered [on my spreadsheet]“.
LoobaLee: Great idea! I started a new similar approach just for my own listings because I realized the importance of knowing two basic things when I go list an item for sale: The retail price, and how much I actually paid for the item. As you point out, including taxes in what you paid for an item is also important. Right now, I don’t enter it into a spreadsheet, but I keep my receipts filed in a box by Brand and by Date. I jot a little note on my receipt about the retail price and the item description. This seems to work for me, as I’m not buying in high volumes, but rather just dressing my kids day-in and day-out.
There you have it! I hope this gives you some ideas. This one Q&A has triggered about 5 more ideas on questions to ask our Sellers!
How about you? Do you have a special method you use to stay organize and track your inventory? Any tips to offer us busy Moms? Please comment and share. Or, if you have a question you would like us to ask, let us know!