Will postage prices eventually kill off the retro market?

[r0jaws]

....but I find people on eBay with thousands of retro items in stock all at stupid buy it now prices damage the retro market more. Effectively holding items at ransom for ages, it'sa then the one person willing to pay such daft prices that allows them to do so. For me only the most rarest of games should go for 25+, yet there's everyday games being listed as "super rare!" which on bids only make a couple of bids....

I agree with this wholeheartedly. I was looking for a copy of Sonic CD and there were a load of BiNs and only one available for bidding. Checking the completed history shows the bid for items complete for considerably less than the BiNs.
The very definition of price driving. Trying to force the market value for your items up, by artificially creating a high value item. It also then makes others less likely to put their items up for auction, but list their items at the current "value".

 

[Harrison]

True. It is getting annoying for certain items on eBay like that... however I tend to want to find a BIN on eBay these days and know I've purchased and paid there and then. I just don't have the time to bid on items like I used to. But yeah, having most sellers hold items at high BIN prices forces all other sellers up to that level because they think they can actually sell for that.

Back on topic.

Someone earlier in the thread stated that Royal Mail are just interested in letters and not parcels. This is completely wrong. Royal Mail now handles more parcels than ever before and it is increasing year on year, where in contrast and as expected the letter volumes are falling year on year.

I has already been mentioned that the cost of living is a major factor in pushing up prices, with fuel now much higher than even a few years ago. But in the UK Royal Mail were forced to keep their prices below operating costs by the regulator Ofcom, which was the main reason for them reporting loses every year. This was relaxed a couple of years ago and RM were finally allowed to set their own prices to realistically reflect their actual running costs. This was why everyone suddenly saw a large stamp price rise, followed by a 3 size parcel pricing structure introduced (to help customers post smaller parcels with less volume for much less).

This has also just been revised with the smallest parcel size now having 2 sets of dimensions, both with the same volumetric size, but one being large but relatively flat (for things like calendars and books) and the other being more box shaped for fitting more regularly shaped items.

The other factor that many people don't consider is where the biggest profits come from for a business like Royal Mail. They don't come from the general public posting items at their post office. They come from bulk business customers like Amazon. For them they don't pay the same prices as the general public to ship their items to their customers. At the distribution hub I work at we see loads of parcels from Amazon going through the system every night. That is a huge revenue generator for the business. In contract having a sack delivered to the hub from a post office containing 12 parcels really isn't that important by contrast.

However, this is where the prices come into play. Royal Mail letter, and Parcel Force might be businesses within the same Royal Mail group company, but their business models are completely different. Parcel Force can charge much less for a parcel to be posted than Royal Mail can at the post office purely due to logistics. Anything posted though Royal Mail has to go through a much larger and more complex chain to end up with your post pan for deliver. Parcel force has a much simpler business model, handling only parcels, with one delivery lorry covering a wider area than each postman.

I say bring on the invention of the teleport, then we can have one in the corner of the room and everything we order can arrive instantly on the pad. It would instantly make a lot of people redundant.. but that's progress!

 

[Juppstein]

Not sure if it is like that in the UK but in other countries the parcel part of the mail companies (i.e. DHL for Deutsche Post) are partly subsidized (though they would never admit that) so they can offer lower rates to stay competitive.

It is also quite interesting that the advertising campaigns for those sub-companies seems to have worked quite well over the years. I've seen numerous comments in different places where people say "I would never send a parcel with company X because they are so slow, I go with Z instead" when in reality X is either

a) only a middle man that will in the end even forward the package to Z
b) X is a direct subsidiary of Z

The other thing is that those very cheap mail companies like Hermes have such a bad rep for how they treat their workforce one is sometimes faced with a guilty feeling when using this kind of delivery service.

 

[Station240]

For some stuff it's a case of seeing what else that seller has for sale that you want. If it's just one item, the postage makes it unviable.

For people outside the UK want to buy some stuff, it's even worse. oh:
The two items I've bought from the UK this year both had a bit of lol postage, as in the 1.5kg one that was £20 would locally get me 10kgs of stuff shipped from a remote corner of Australia, and still leave me with 2/3rds of my money.

 

[User4703]

Relax folks, within a year or so you'll have your own personal drone that will be able to skivvy all over the UK for you (at a cost, the license will cost a pretty penny when these catch on) and you won't need to post anything anymore.

Just sit your corpulency on your couch and control via remote, which most will just let the satnav script.

Hence the term, as lazy a pig <does the teeth thing>.

 

[Killerchicken]

No,

The moonpeople and there moonprices will....
250 buks for an a2k or 400 for a dead cbm 8032

Times where the hobby can be afforded by anyone are over ...

Example:
C64 turns 30, prices of anything just old are roketing
**RAR** **MINT** ***L@@K*** --- at my junk

10 PRINT "TALKPAD" : GOTO 10

 

[SimonLCFC]

True. It is getting annoying for certain items on eBay like that... however I tend to want to find a BIN on eBay these days and know I've purchased and paid there and then. I just don't have the time to bid on items like I used to. But yeah, having most sellers hold items at high BIN prices forces all other sellers up to that level because they think they can actually sell for that.

Sadly it isn't just Evilbay that is filled with price drivers (and don't get me started on one particularly evil little *@$%!) Certain retro selling sites also seem to be seriously guilty of attempting this (without naming names - not sure if i'm breaking rules by giving prices, but I can cope with a slap on the wrist and a censoring of my post...) Examples,

I picked up Crazy Kong by Supersoft in a bundle, this site listed it as <snip> a precious sum </snip> , completed listing on eBay - <snip> 1/50th of precious sum </snip>...

Bought Caverns of Khafka (yep, I know it's rubbish, but the audio is fantastic!) from a great seller on eBay for a very reasonable <snip> a less precious sum </snip> - the only other copy anywhere was <snip> over twice that original sum</snip>, on this other site.

I'm sure somebodies stuck something up at a price that's a little high (my lack of knowledge on many systems has caused me to do this from time to time) and everybody who gets something a little rare or out of the ordinary wants to make a few quid on it, but there's a difference between making a bit and taking the ****. And I agree with Killerchicken - some of the hardware flogged these days is stupidly high, pricing genuine fans out of the market all in the name of profit. Most of what I get from selling goes back to buying stuff, adding to the collection, et. al. I actually like playing this stuff (when i've got fully working hardware that is - rant on Datasettes to come )

But, yes, back on topic.

For most of my stuff - smaller parcels - I tend to use RM. It's not ideal, but the staff there are helpful and try to keep the costs down as much as they can. P2G I use for other stuff, normally City Link, who are mostly reliable, have occasionally failed to turn up, but it's not a Yodel-like regular occurence.
And if i'm completely honest, I hate sending internationally. Not because of any kind of effort, but the price increases has made it seem that UK sellers are out to virtually-mug foreign buyers for having the impudence to want something from here. First time I started selling, about 3 years ago, I refused to post abroad because of the prices - in one instance that got me a shitty message and some neutral feedback, but I can see why a fair amount of UK sellers refuse to post abroad, and I can imagine a fair few foreign chaps (or chapesses) will refuse to buy from here. Sometimes it's easier to play a waiting game, see if what you want will turn up in your neck of the woods.

Si



[edit]
Yes, I edited out your post... you know I was going to... thats why you invited me to do it Z

 

[Buzzfuzz]

Sometimes it's easier to play a waiting game, see if what you want will turn up in your neck of the woods.

Quite true, for example the big retro collection that turned up here is just 1 of them, there are many more and once people get rid of it, that is when I go have a look.

With the amount of things sold here and Germany and the UK, there is enough going around in storages and lofts, we just have to find it.

That said, most things will have been thrown away and then finding something too far away requires a lot of postage or some insane long driving.

A while back I went to Willycat to pick up a 3000 Micronik tower, well that was some trip.
If it had been smaller and less weight, I would have taken tracked postage for sure, but that is the problem with real heavy things.

I also understand the other side, fuel costs are rising and paper or cardboard isn't cheap either these days.
Consider also the pilots on aircraft who actually have to pay to fly or being hired for flights, rather than a full time contract, and you get the idea of why postage is also one of the crisis victims.

 

[Station240]

I also understand the other side, fuel costs are rising and paper or cardboard isn't cheap either these days.

I haven't actually paid for a cardboard box since 2005, and those were removalist's cartons which I have since been slowly cutting down and posting to people. The local evil hardware chain store have a stash of empty cardboard boxes for people to take next to the exit. I brought home two huge boxes today.

 

[protek]

Can someone please explain, how come it costs $30 to ship a circuit board size of a floppy disk from USA to Finland?!?!? And for the record, this item is not from WoldemortBay.

 

[sputnik]

Can someone please explain, how come it costs $30 to ship a circuit board size of a floppy disk from USA to Finland?!?!? And for the record, this item is not from WoldemortBay.

Because someone wants the other $25 for beer

 

[DojoDan]

Out of interest, a q to you good chaps of the US of A, how do you find USPS pricing? I'm quite happy buying stuff from the states at the moment. 7 quid fully tracked for a megadrive game is great value I think. That's the lowest I've paid up to now but averages around 8. Im much happier RM have reduced small parcel 1-2kg to 3.80 (if im not mistaken). 5.20 or whatever it was before was well off the mark. International standard seems good value for lighter items too.

This seems q good place to ask, does anyone have experience with eBays global postage programme? I've never used it at the duty at checkout seems higher to me, altho only just realised when u pay duty the postage price is included too which is plain wrong. I always ask sellers just to use USPS, some don't like filling in forms tho.

 

[sputnik]

Out of interest, a q to you good chaps of the US of A, how do you find USPS pricing? I'm quite happy buying stuff from the states at the moment. 7 quid fully tracked for a megadrive game is great value I think. That's the lowest I've paid up to now but averages around 8. Im much happier RM have reduced small parcel 1-2kg to 3.80 (if im not mistaken). 5.20 or whatever it was before was well off the mark. International standard seems good value for lighter items too.

This seems q good place to ask, does anyone have experience with eBays global postage programme? I've never used it at the duty at checkout seems higher to me, altho only just realised when u pay duty the postage price is included too which is plain wrong. I always ask sellers just to use USPS, some don't like filling in forms tho.

I used global postage programme - once!

Seemed an absolute bargain.

Then the item was rejected for being oversized even though the seller stated all the correction weight / dimensions before sending it.

 

[NinjaRabbit]

This seems q good place to ask, does anyone have experience with eBays global postage programme? I've never used it at the duty at checkout seems higher to me, altho only just realised when u pay duty the postage price is included too which is plain wrong. I always ask sellers just to use USPS, some don't like filling in forms tho.

There's a thread about it over here. It contains varying views on it, and some videos, as well.

 

[DojoDan]

I'll have a gander.

 

[ancalimon]

I think if you find what you are looking for and it's heavy (in my case a M1764 monitor), it would be more logical to go to that country for a holiday to collect it yourself.

 

[multivac]

I used to purchase books regularly from the USA and always asked to have the heavy package sent by the cheapest method. Now only Airmail is offered by USPS and the costs have increased by at least two or even three times. Other carriers are even more expensive. I have purchased Amiga items from the USA and used to have them sent surface and the cost wasn't too bad now it's time to think twice about the shipping costs.