Selling my eBay Business

[fbalev]

Hi everyone,

I`m looking to sell a business I`ve been running for a while and I need a bit of help. Maybe you can suggest a good place to advertise this ? Or maybe you know someone who will be interested? I was not sure if this is the right forum section, but as this will be a potential opportunity for someone to start a new business, I think this might fit OK here.

Here is a brief description without going into too much detail:

I started this business while being a student to contribute financially to my studies and therefore the scale of it and commitment needed is still resembling what you might imagine a part-time/student business to look like. It is essentially an automotive repair tool I am selling on Ebay. I initially developed/designed this (the tool) for my personal use and then decided to try selling it. I was nicely surprised to see that worked well and now few years later I have thousands of happy customers and 100% positive feedback on Ebay.

Now a bit of numbers and details:

Sales are low volume – around 650 per year or an average of 55 per month. I have not tried to scale this – neither have I tried to sell it elsewhere apart from ebay.co.uk nor have I done any improvements, A/B testing etc. to the Ebay listings I currently run. They have remained unchanged for the past 3 years. Even the pics are from 2012.

Margin is excellent and profit per item sold after material costs, ebay&paypal fees and postage and packing works out to be around £5.50

Time needed to assemble the tool and prepare it to be shipped is around an hour per 20 pieces, so not more than couple of hours per month.

Technology is easy to learn – my girlfriend does them in my absence

The tool fits in standard D1 large letter giffy bag and I drop these off in the red post boxes on the street with a standard stamp stuck on the envelope. So virtually no effort in relation to shipping the product either. Total time the whole business takes per month I would say is 2-3 hours to prepare and pack product and a few spare minutes every day to drop the sold ones in a post box on your way to/from work.

That said the average profit per month divided by the hours it takes to run, makes it quite an attractive side business.

The ebay account I use will also be part of the deal. This has 100% positive feedback and relatively high selling limits (3000 items / £30K per month). Listings are all set up and running.

Reason for sale is genuine – I`ll be leaving the country, so would be quite difficult for me to run this remotely.

Following advice from other fellow starupers I`ve valued this to be 18 months worth of profit, which is a bit over £5300. This is of course negotiable.

If you know anyone that might be interested, or if you have any ideas where to advertise, please share your thoughts !

Thank you all in advance!

 

[billmccallum1957]

can you give an ebay number to have a look?

 

[silvermusic]

Hate to tell you this, but you can't sell or transfer an eBay account. Not without their permission which is normally only given when one Ltd company buys or amalgamates with another. The product may be of interest to someone as an addition to their business, but as it stands that's all you really have to sell, assuming it's not copied by the Chinese if it starts to sell in significant quantities.

 

[Clinton]

I agree with silvermusic. There are multiple impediments to the "sale" of businesses like these and every impediment impacts on sellability and on the price you can get.

The big one, of course, is the non-transferability of an eBay business.

If you were setup as a limited company, you could sell the whole company. As you are setup now it's against eBay's rules to sell. That said, a sale can still be done... in a bit of a sneaky way, but the buyer is taking on a big risk as he could get banned if eBay ever get to find out. That acts as a damper on price.

#2: While you may see the assembly as low-tech, it is essentially an impediment as there's a time commitment involved. If I were looking to buy an eBay business my first preference would be a drop-ship (where I don't even handle the goods). The next would be retail - get the goods in and ship myself or use a fulfilment company. And at the very bottom would be any business that involved me assembling bits or making the product. I would also factor in 10-15 minutes per day (and some petrol) to get to the nearest postbox. That's a fair bit when added up for the month. And 3 minutes (per piece) when multiplied by 55 doesn't equal your "not more than couple of hours per month". Small difference, but you shouldn't take any risks with credibility when selling a business or buyers will feel they can't trust your other claims.

Following advice from other fellow starupers I`ve valued this to be 18 months worth of profit, which is a bit over £5300. This is of course negotiable.

The rules of thumb for business valuations never cease to amaze me. I've studied valuations in great detail and written extensively on business valuations (recent example). Take it from me, there is no standard way to value a business!

There are a few buyers for Amazon and eBay businesses but they are looking for larger operations. There are very few buyers for smaller setups like yours. I can give you a tip or two on how to reach them, but you'll have to drastically revise your price expectations. Be warned, these small time operators generally don't have the capital upfront and would seek to reach a profit-share arrangement. If they did pay upfront I wouldn't be surprised if they offered you 3x your monthly profit instead of 18x.

 

[Iain Hill]

Hi,

Depending on the process it may be something that a fulfilment company is interested in, this may depend on work and time involved. We rework many items but would completely depend on the process involved.

This could essentially mean that you keep the business running yourself but all of the operatons are run by the fulfilment house.

I am from a fulfilment company and if this is of interest let me know.

Good luck with whatever you plan to do.

Many Thanks

Iain