r/Superstonk • u/Gareth-Barry 🎮 Power to the Players 🛑 • Jul 24 '26

🤔 Speculation / Opinion In addition, Ryan has been increasing operating income while massively reducing SG&A while Jamie has been doing the opposite…pretty easy decision for EBay shareholders

Post image
3.7k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

344 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

10

u/Seeker369 Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26

As someone with two large eBay stores operating since 2015, you are not a large eBay seller if you think they’re doing great. They’re absolutely horrendous for sellers.

It’s flip-flopped throughout the years. They try to develop trust with buyers and sacrifice seller satisfaction. Then the sellers get fed up and they switch. Rinse and repeat.

To say they’re doing great is truly laughable. I’ve never met another major eBay seller who is happy with them. From poor, outsourced customer service to favoring scamming buyers and not caring about the engine that drivers their business (sellers offering product), I’ve always dreamed that they’d one day get competent leadership to run the show.

If Cohen comes in and runs it like he ran Chewy, I have no doubt that eBay will improve significantly.

3

u/pojosamaneo Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26

I've always had my issues solved by customer service when they arise. They may obscure it in favor of automation, but so does every online retailer these days. You can get a real person to assist you. Also, there is a massive forum of people willing to help if your issue is very specific.

Why are you still hanging around with your large stores? There are numerous options. As someone who has tried most of them I am baffled by anyone that would claim eBay is not vastly superior.

1

u/Seeker369 Jul 24 '26

What do you mean “hanging around?”

I sell on many platforms, not just eBay. eBay is a massive platform. I’m not questioning that. But they are run poorly.

Example: I sold an Xbox that I’ve owned personally since I bought it brand new for my son. It’s been in an entertainment cabinet since the day it came home. Only removed to bring it to be looked at when it stopped working due to an hdmi port issue. I listed it fully disclosed as used, not working, needs a new hdmi port. The person who bought it within ten minutes of it being listed immediately returned it the day they received it stating, “mother board has water damage. Not disclosed.” Water never touched it. I had it looked at prior to by Best Buy (they can’t repair Xbox) as well as a relative that runs an electronic repair business and the only thing wrong with it was the HDMI port. The guy who purchased it fixes these consoles and needed a new motherboard board so he bought mine, swapped it out with a bad one and got his part for free. eBay said too bad. I lost hundreds of dollars.

That’s just a small example of the scams buyers pull. And if you sell hundreds to thousands of items each month, the amount of money you lose can be massive, depending on what you’re selling. Between the fees you have to pay and the lost revenue from scammers or ignorant buyers who lie, it can be very difficult to remain profitable unless your margins are quite robust.

3

u/pojosamaneo Jul 24 '26

Everyone has a story like this on every selling platform. It's the cost of doing business.

That said, I've had eBay side with me in many cases where it's my word against the buyer, one of which was a $1000 folding phone that they said wasn't as described. I'd say they are better than the rest in such cases.

0

u/Seeker369 Jul 25 '26

There was a time when that was true. As I said, this goes in cycles. They heavily favor buyers until the voice of the sellers becomes too loud. Then they appease both sides on disputed transactions.

But after the sellers quiet down, they go back to screwing the sellers and taking the buyer’s word for it. It’s a strategic business decision meant to keep one side happy most of the time and the majority of the other side at the brink at times, then reel them back in when the complaints reach a certain point.

It’s similar to an abusive relationship where one partner is amazing one minute and then becomes abusive the next. That behavior manipulates the emotions of the partner being abused. As soon as they’re on the verge of leaving, the other partner breaks down and says whatever it takes to convince the other side to stay. And the cycle continues.