By Cara Gargano
Ever wonder where all of Justin Timberlake’s used bandanas go? Where you can get the 1991 Rolling Stone issue with Robin Williams on the cover? Where to buy a large house for two in Buffalo, NY? Or where you can buy 86 acres of the Millenia District in Orlando, Fla.? EBay.com is the one place for the answers. It boasts more than 12 million items listed on eBay across 18,000 categories.
“The first thing I ever bid on was a souped up engine for an Acura Integra. I didn’t even own an Integra but my friend and some guy from Holland were selling the same engine at the same time but the Dutchman’s price was lower,” Michael Bongardino, a sophomore undecided major, said. “So I kept on bidding on the Holland’s guy engine to drive up the price so my friend could sell his engine. Well, it worked, but I wasn’t paying attention and I won the auction. I suddenly owed a very angry Dutchman over $5,000 and had no intention of paying and was banned from eBay later that week. So that [incident] started and ended my eBay career.”
The eBay community is made up of a variety of people. The community consists of individual buyers and sellers, small businesses and Fortune 100 companies. However, to many customers it goes way beyond just a community, it’s a lifestyle. Many members of eBay have created second businesses by selling items on the site. Some people have moved their brick and mortar business to eBay while others have quit their day jobs. For millions of people, eBay is the place to shop for practically anything that is on and off the market.
“You can literally find anything off of eBay, you can even buy used cosmetics which I find disgusting and repulsive and is something I would never do in my life ever,” sophomore elementary education major Nicole Hazar said.
For those who do not have much spending money, eBay is a great place to search for anything out on the market.
“Well, I’m really into motorcycles and since eBay has a large variety of motorcycles on their site I can search them at ease,” freshman business major Eric Lawler said.
The first step to using eBay is setting up an account. Everything else is relatively simple: just find, buy and pay. However, not everything is as easy as it seems. One must understand that eBay is not free to use. A percentage of what the seller promotes goes to eBay, though the pricing of the items can range anywhere from a single cent to hundreds of thousands of dollars.
“I bought a body kit for my car off of eBay,” sophomore accounting major Tyler Puitz said. “I bought the kit for $400 and it was originally $800 so I got it for half the price. I’ve already received it and I didn’t even have to pay much for shipping. I usually do a lot of my shopping off of eBay motors which strictly sells parts for your vehicles and I’m pretty much addicted to that.”
Nonetheless, many eBay users tend to make a profit off the shipping fee. Each buyer pays a the fee for the items purchased. The shipping fee is the amount that the buyer makes-up, so technically the seller can overcharge the buyer, making a few extra dollars for themselves.
“I once sold snowboarding boots that were given to me as a gift. I sold them for $200 which was the actual price of the boots even though technically I never paid a dime for them. The shipping cost was only $10 but I made the price $17 so I could make a few extra dollars,” sophomore finance major Andy Hartman said. “I did it through Pay Pal which guarantees the money right away because my credit card is already registered on it so then the money then goes directly into my account. I never have to worry about getting cash getting lost in the mail or a bounced check.”
However, it is important to be cautious about who the seller is. Some people purchase but the items that never come. It could be anything from a $3 bottle of hair dye to a $500 head unit for a car. It is also important for the sellers to be trustworthy about their products.
“Once I sold a pair of socks with holes in them and said they were Doogie Howser’s socks, because I needed $10,” Hazar said.
Since there are many scam artists that belong to the eBay community, some people are afraid to order off of the site because they do not want to get scammed.
“I’ve never ordered anything off of eBay because I’m too scared,” sophomore undecided major, Kiki Fotiadis said. ” I don’t know if I ever will, but I would hate to pay for something that never comes.”
There is a rating system for both the sellers and buyers who are part of the community that helps to insure that neither party gets scammed. EBay is a community built on trust for both the buyers and sellers. When that trust is broken it could lead to a loss of membership for that member. This is a rare occurrence and most customers are please with their eBay interactions.
The buying process was swift and easy and the delivery came as promised, sophomore Rob Fazekas, a finance major, said after recently making a purchase off of the website.
Some products on eBay are priced significantly lower than in retail.
“My roommate, Christian Cortese, bought a set of headlights for his car off of eBay,” Tony Guarascio, a junior management major, said. “The headlights were successfully received and the price was pretty cheap because he paid $235 for the set and they are normally listed at $700.”
EBay’s motto is The World’s Online Marketplace because the company is the largest online auction site on the Internet. EBay has had astounding success. It was founded in 1995 and is now traded on the NASDAQ. EBay members transacted almost $15 billion in annualized gross merchandise sales according to CNN.com.
EBay users, like this University student, buy many items from the Web site. This students bought 3-D puzzles for his hobby. (Paul Palazzolo/ The Chronicle)