Selling Makeup on eBay How To Start

I recently received this query from Tracy, a new Cheap Slap member:

Hi Mel

I signed up to your wholesale makeup site last weekend and just wanted to ask a few questions if that’s ok.

I have recently been made redundant and have been dabbling with selling the odd beauty item on eBay for about a year, mainly unwanted items or parts of sets etc., but now wanted to take it a bit more serious to help with some extra cash.

Do you think this is the way to go? Also would I be safer to order from a UK wholesaler to begin with.

The other nagging question is what brands to sell, I personally use brands like Smashbox, Bobbi Brown, Laura Geller etc, and I know that UK cosmetics suppliers do not seem to stock these, they mainly have the middle of the road names like Max Factor, L’oreal etc, but there seems to be hundreds of these on eBay already!!

I am not under the impression of making a fortune on eBay but I also do not want to invest money for nothing.

Would be very grateful for any advice.

Thanks very much

Tracy F

Here is my response to Tracy:

Hi Tracy

If you have a limited budget I would advise you to start off with one of the recommended UK makeup wholesalers on Cheap Slap. You can start with a low minimum order, and you can buy just 1 or 3 of each item. That way you can get a mixed selection to see what sells best for you. Recent stock includes benefit eyeshadows and some nice gift sets which could be sold separately, also perfume testers sell well and give a good profit (they are new testers, not actually used, it just means that they are usually marked tester and unboxed). There is no golden rule of what to sell, as the makeup market is so massive it depends who your customer is. A lot of people assume that they should be going for names like MAC and benefit, but there is often a much better mark up on brands like Maybelline, L’oreal etc. because you can buy those items so cheaply e.g. mascaras for £1ish.

My recommendation would be to start selling locally if you can rather than eBay. If you do decide to go down the eBay route, before you buy anything to sell on there, always watch some identical items to check the final selling price so you can work out what your eBay profit would be. Remember to allow for eBay fees and Paypal fees. Selling locally is preferable in my opinion as there are no fees, also you can actually ask your customers what they want before you order, and collect the money in advance so you are never out of pocket. If you take a look at my blog there are 3 articles about how to do this. The first one is here.

Also, a final point on eBay, and this is something everyone has different views on. It may be that you only make a small profit on each item. As a worst case scenario, say you only make £1 profit on each item you sell. For that, a lot of people give up and think it’s not worth the bother. But in my view any profit at all is money that you would not have had otherwise. If you sell 20 items a day, you then have £20 a day profit, which starts to make things worthwhile. So it’s something to think about.

Hope that helps

Best wishes

Melissa

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