Stupid Question: selling hats

[Altiori]

Greetings to all.

I'm more than unsure about how best to proceed and welcome your advice. I've searched through the lounge and have seen numerous hat sales and purchases.

I'm at a loss on how to do it myself.

I have about 4-5 high quality felts, some Stetsons, some Borsalino ranging in age from 30 years to 5 years. Not vintage necessarily but each fedora of excellent modern quality. All are size 60
(7 1/2) and in excellent condition.

I'm selling them simply because I have no more room. My wife is a very good woman. And she understands my obsession with hats. But we shall not be building an annex.

I see many hats on eBay. But as I have been a member of the FL for many years, I'd prefer to sell first to folks who appreciate a fine hat. Not only to those who own more than a few, but perhaps to some of our younger members (I'm 65) who might want to purchase a good hat without breaking the bank and to be encouraged in our shared passion.

I'm happy to do EBay. But is there recommended method to sell on the Lounge? And if there are earlier yet still current links to the process I'd be happy to check them out.

Welcome your recommendations.

Than you all and peace and blessings of Christmas and of the season.

 

[belfastboy]

Thank you for thinking of the Lounge members. Use the Classified section to sell items. post lots of good quality pictures, be generous with the details of the hat.....crown height, brim width, etc... ....list any imperfections, odours, moth nibbles etc......full disclosure. Use a respected service such as PayPal that gives buyer protection against scammers. The internet is a cesspool of fake sellers these days. Last thing, you must list a price for the hat. It helps to include the cost of mailing so the price listed is the final price.

 

[Trouser Bark]

I agree w/ Belfast's comments and would add one aspect that may merit consideration. It is that you're listing it here first as a professional courtesy to other like minded folks w/ a known appreciation for the same thing you like. That carries with it a connotation and it is that this group is small with maybe 500 unique members logging in over the course of a day. A lot of those aren't here to view hats and may instead be reading women's stuff or leather jacket info, etc.

On the flip side FleaBay may have over a million unique logons every day and the size of the audience is key to moving your hats. If you aren't in a rush it might be that you could list them here for a couple weeks and then consider a broader audience.

 

[belfastboy]

I agree w/ Belfast's comments and would add one aspect that may merit consideration. It is that you're listing it here first as a professional courtesy to other like minded folks w/ a known appreciation for the same thing you like. That carries with it a connotation and it is that this group is small with maybe 500 unique members logging in over the course of a day. A lot of those aren't here to view hats and may instead be reading women's stuff or leather jacket info, etc.

On the flip side FleaBay may have over a million unique logons every day and the size of the audience is key to moving your hats. If you aren't in a rush it might be that you could list them here for a couple weeks and then consider a broader audience.

I am not in the game of searching out hat bargains and reselling. But I know a few guys that are.. They all say that Ebay is a pain in the ass......but it is still the best, most effective, receives the highest prices, of any venue for the selling of hats. I trust their perspective as they sell many hundreds of hats in the course of a year.

 

[Altiori]

Greetings to all.

I'm more than unsure about how best to proceed and welcome your advice. I've searched through the lounge and have seen numerous hat sales and purchases.

I'm at a loss on how to do it myself.

I have about 4-5 high quality felts, some Stetsons, some Borsalino ranging in age from 30 years to 5 years. Not vintage necessarily but each fedora of excellent modern quality. All are size 60
(7 1/2) and in excellent condition.

I'm selling them simply because I have no more room. My wife is a very good woman. And she understands my obsession with hats. But we shall not be building an annex.

I see many hats on eBay. But as I have been a member of the FL for many years, I'd prefer to sell first to folks who appreciate a fine hat. Not only to those who own more than a few, but perhaps to some of our younger members (I'm 65) who might want to purchase a good hat without breaking the bank and to be encouraged in our shared passion.

I'm happy to do EBay. But is there recommended method to sell on the Lounge? And if there are earlier yet still current links to the process I'd be happy to check them out.

Welcome your recommendations.

Than you all and peace and blessings of Christmas and of the season.

Tks for all of the advice and support.

I just listed four hats on EBay. 2 Borsalino; one Worth and Worth; and a Cavanagh Trilby.

Peace.

 

[belfastboy]

Tks for all of the advice and support.

I just listed four hats on EBay. 2 Borsalino; one Worth and Worth; and a Cavanagh Trilby.

Peace.

It is OK to post links to the Ebay page in the Classifieds.

 

[ScottF]

Greetings to all.

I'm more than unsure about how best to proceed and welcome your advice. I've searched through the lounge and have seen numerous hat sales and purchases.

I'm at a loss on how to do it myself.

I have about 4-5 high quality felts, some Stetsons, some Borsalino ranging in age from 30 years to 5 years. Not vintage necessarily but each fedora of excellent modern quality. All are size 60
(7 1/2) and in excellent condition.

I'm selling them simply because I have no more room. My wife is a very good woman. And she understands my obsession with hats. But we shall not be building an annex.

I see many hats on eBay. But as I have been a member of the FL for many years, I'd prefer to sell first to folks who appreciate a fine hat. Not only to those who own more than a few, but perhaps to some of our younger members (I'm 65) who might want to purchase a good hat without breaking the bank and to be encouraged in our shared passion.

I'm happy to do EBay. But is there recommended method to sell on the Lounge? And if there are earlier yet still current links to the process I'd be happy to check them out.

Welcome your recommendations.

Than you all and peace and blessings of Christmas and of the season.

I sell all of my hats on eBay, but lounge members who notice my hats on eBay are always welcome to contact me for a better deal. I tried posting here first, but I think I've maybe sold 5 hats in the Classifieds here, and maybe 300 on eBay. The problem is that the members here are really the experts in finding inexpensive fantastic hats, so they aren't crazy about paying what I can get on eBay.

Just being straight-forward about my own experience, but I think it's great to try here first. I still throw one out there every now and then.

 

[RickP]

Just to add a thought here regarding the selling on ebay process.....Since early october literally EVERY package Ive had coming in has been delayed in Coppell/ Dallas Tx for as long as 16 days ( Have one up there at 14 days and one at 16 right now). Has been an ongoing issue with sever major sorting and processing USPS centers lately. I can only imagine the stress it adds to a seller when a package disappears into USPS Purgatory.

Id like to see more sellers at least offer an option for fed ex or UPS shipping. More expensive but it actually gets to the destination Un-crushed. Id personally be happy to pay $20 fed ex over a $10 USPS shipping .... I think most hat buyers would be glad to see that option at checkout as well

 

[ScottF]

Just to add a thought here regarding the selling on ebay process.....Since early october literally EVERY package Ive had coming in has been delayed in Coppell/ Dallas Tx for as long as 16 days ( Have one up there at 14 days and one at 16 right now). Has been an ongoing issue with sever major sorting and processing USPS centers lately. I can only imagine the stress it adds to a seller when a package disappears into USPS Purgatory.

Id like to see more sellers at least offer an option for fed ex or UPS shipping. More expensive but it actually gets to the destination Un-crushed. Id personally be happy to pay $20 fed ex over a $10 USPS shipping .... I think most hat buyers would be glad to see that option at checkout as well

Rick, it's interesting that you bring this up. I've noticed over the years that the distribution centers having problems will vary over time periods. For a long time everything that hit Memphis got stuck, then things that arrived in Seattle often left, headed east, then came back again (which was really frustrating since I live 35 miles from Seattle). It was crazy. Still - I can ship a hat USPS Priority for under $14 and generally it's going to move pretty fast.

Given that I've opened my big mouth in this thread, I'm currently selling a few hats, and I'm not participating in any other forums very much, I guess I'll hang out here for a while. Looking around I'm kind of stunned at all the guys who are missing, who were huge contributors ten years ago - some young guys who must have started wearing baseball caps again

 

[Zombie_61]

...Looking around I'm kind of stunned at all the guys who are missing, who were huge contributors ten years ago - some young guys who must have started wearing baseball caps again

The good folks who are responsible for keeping The Lounge open saw fit to do a software upgrade around that time, but from the observer's seat over here that upgrade was not flawless. Initially there were issues with members simply logging onto the site, and a lot of former Loungers grew tired of the problems and just moved on. We lost some good members, but around that time it seems a lot of current members had discovered The Lounge and liked it well enough to stick around. So, lose some, win some. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[ScottF]

The good folks who are responsible for keeping The Lounge open saw fit to do a software upgrade around that time, but from the observer's seat over here that upgrade was not flawless. Initially there were issues with members simply logging onto the site, and a lot of former Loungers grew tired of the problems and just moved on. We lost some good members, but around that time it seems a lot of current members had discovered The Lounge and liked it well enough to stick around. So, lose some, win some. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Well, that sucks. I left for practical reasons. I started dating my current girlfriend in 2008 and when she moved into my small studio condo that had probably ten hat racks and maybe 60 hats on the wall, as well as hat-repair tools, etc, in every corner of the room, she let me know how she 'felt'. I had another 50-100 hats stacked in boxes and in the closet, so I sold all but a couple and disappeared from the hat world. I probably keep ten or so hats around these days. I learned one valuable lesson from 'the great hat divestment': if a hat is beautiful and fits you perfectly, never sell it.

 

[RickP]

Ive got a simplier problem...... Im amost out of wall space to put more hat racks up lol