The Wholesale Forums

[joslin]

Does anyone have any advice on buying and selling mobile phones. I am looking to buy and re sell on ebay. I have purchased wholesale lists off ebay but find them to be pretty useless if i am honest.

Is this a profitable area and what is the best way to go about it.

Any advice would be appreciated, thanks .

[wragge11]

I think one post would surfice!

[BillyA]

Depends on where you are. If in the UK, the market is tight and you are competing with folks that receive free upgrade phones - they then sell them on ebay for 100% profit. Can't compete with that.

If in the US, then there is a decent market.

[MustHaveMobiles]

Its a tough market but there are opportunities still, the correct supplier is key to the equation and an ability to purchase in decent quantities to bring the price down. 10's and 20's are no good from a margin perspective.

Ebay can work for the right handsets but you are better off getting your own site started and develop together to maximise income streams..

[BillyA]

Ahh Mike, but then the question becomes "If I can only buy 20-50 phones (and most supplier MOQs are 20-50 per model), then how can I stock a complete website?"

The handset market is indeed difficult to enter.

[amazingfinance]

Its all to do with the supplier. We have got some fantastic supplier, some great prices, we get charged prices for 1 handset that you would have to pay for 50. But we just end up buying 50.. lol

[MustHaveMobiles]

Originally Posted by BillyA

Ahh Mike, but then the question becomes "If I can only buy 20-50 phones (and most supplier MOQs are 20-50 per model), then how can I stock a complete website?"

The handset market is indeed difficult to enter.

Dropship or combine handsets to meet MOQ's....if the supplier doesn't do the combination deals as a bare minimum then they are the wrong supplier.

Its all to do with the supplier. We have got some fantastic supplier, some great prices, we get charged prices for 1 handset that you would have to pay for 50. But we just end up buying 50.. lol

I agree it can happen, but even a 50 MOQ doesn't really produce the prices that most people would 'want'. Personally I wouldn't recommend thinking solely about one handset type in large quantities, think about large quantities of assorted handsets and negotiate a pricing deal on that. Again if your supplier will not contemplate such a deal then look for another supplier, my supplier will provide any quantity I require combining any number of handsets and also processes a volume duiscount (which I am really happy about)