Where Can I Sell Body Decoration Items Online?

April 7, 2008 4:34 AM

How can I effectively sell cheap (<20 GBP) accessories and body decoration items online in the UK?

Question for a friend:

She has a number of very cheap (on average 5 GBP) funky body decoration items that she sold from her shop (in addition to other things).

Unfortunately, the shop has closed down but she would like to continue to sell the items online. Her main concerns are:

1. Exposure -- She's looking for the items to be found and noticed easily
2. Ease of use/Lack of expense -- It is certainly beyond her means to start creating merchant accounts, etc.. ideally paypal and the ability to manually track orders would be fine.
3. Expansion -- She would like to be able to put things up and take them down easily as her line of items changes quite rapidly.
4. Location -- UK would be best but European and US sites are acceptable as well.

She has tried ebay but finds that her goods get drowned in the volume of items ebay has available.

Any other recommendations received gratefully.

posted by gadha to clothing, beauty, & fashion (5 comments total)

etsy.com?
posted by robcorr at 4:58 AM on April 7, 2008

Etsy or eBay are about the extent of your options. Are you sure they're being "drowned?" Maybe they're just not as desirable as she thinks. One thing is for sure, as far as exposure goes it doesn't get better than eBay and if something is not selling then try starting them at 99p and letting them find their own value. Articles that don't get a bid at 99p on eBay probably aren't saleable.
posted by fire&wings at 5:02 AM on April 7, 2008

Shopify.com and a paypal websites payment account, I think.
posted by beerbajay at 6:07 AM on April 7, 2008

There also is Dawanda. It's similar to Etsy, but Dawanda has specific sites for Great Britain, Germany and France.
posted by amf at 7:21 AM on April 7, 2008

Exposure is going to be partly her duty. I know someone who operates an online shop in the UK. She has had to get the message out about her products to the right groups of people.

Hence, she mentions the shop or displays a banner on most webspace she has (including MySpace, LiveJournal, and the like), and since her target audience is people like herself and her friends, going out and spreading the word to others within the same circle or group (In this case, Goths).

The burden is upon her to drum up demand. If she does, she will have a better foundation for a flourishing business. Sites like eBay can provide a good start before your friend gets her own site and shop up and running (this is where my acquaintance got her start), but if the items get lost initially it's likely because she isn't doing enough of the right promotion.
posted by cmgonzalez at 11:58 AM on April 7, 2008