Innovate or Die: eBay at a Crossroads

I was watching a TV Special on CNBC last night entitled "The Business of Innovation" and sub-titled "From Boardroom Theory to Business Reality" and I kept waiting for the segment where John Donahoe of eBay came onto the stage and discussed the "Disruptive Innovation" happening at eBay.

Of course that segment of the show has yet to be written and the outcome is far from certain. Will the "Disruptive Innovation" happening at eBay be an example of how to re-invigorate a stagnant business model or how to kill a "good thing".

During the show, they profiled numerous companies that had undergone "disruptive innovation" and not only survived the changes but succeeded in fundamentally changing their business. Do you remember the Korean electronics company called GoldStar? I know I only had a faint recollection of the company. I was surprised to learn that Goldstar is now known as LG a leader in many consumer electronics and household appliance categories -- they changed their brand in order to succeed. Some of these companies are still a work in progress; take the venerable Eastman Kodak.

Kodak is a great example of a business that was in crisis. They made their money selling film and chemicals for film processing and were a hugely profitable, well-known and respected brand, but the winds of change in technology had brought them to a crossroads. Digital cameras had taken over the market and very quickly the once vibrant company was in crisis.

In Nov of 2006, Business Week profiled the struggle at Kodak (EK):

When Eastman Kodak vowed in 2000 to become a leader in digital cameras, the idea seemed ludicrous. The old-line Rochester (N.Y.) company had film and print all through its DNA. Yet by 2005, Kodak ranked No. 1 in the U.S. in digital camera sales. Its digital sales surged 40%, to $5.7 billion, even as its film-based businesses fell 18%. The key: product innovation, something Kodak knew how to do oh-so-well. The company designed one award-winning breakthrough after another to make digital photography nearly as simple as pointing and clicking.

So why does Kodak Chief Executive Antonio M. Perez now dump on digital cameras, calling them a "crappy business"? Simple: While blazing growth of camera sales has helped blunt the effects of Kodak's fast-fading film revenues, it hasn't replaced the rich profits of the film business. Even the best mass-market cameras yield slim profit margins. So, although Kodak's digital camera business was a roaring sales success, it turned out to be a crushing profit disappointment. Perez, who arrived at Kodak in 2003 and became chief executive last year, had championed a dramatic change only to find it wasn't the right model for turning the company around.

Now he's crafting yet another strategy for Kodak, its third in less than a decade. Building on the mistakes made and lessons learned in recent years, Perez is attempting innovation of another sort -- reinventing the company's core business model. He aims to make Kodak do for photos what Apple does for music: help people to organize and manage their personal libraries of images. He's developing a slew of new digital photo services for consumers that he expects to yield higher returns. They include everything from online photo sharing to a rapid-fire scanning system, called Scan the World, that takes shoe boxes full of yellowed snapshots and converts them into crisp digital images organized by the date originally printed. But the shift from hard product to digital services is a huge challenge. It's "a very hard transformation," says Perez. "History says very few companies have made it." (bold is mine)

The parallels between Kodak and eBay are numerous; eBay is a global leader in auctions with 90% of the worldwide auction business, much like Kodak was the leader in film, but auctions are not growing fast enough for investors and it is clear that consumers want Fixed Price convenience over "Shopping Victoriously" with auctions, so eBay is changing the way they do business and now want to become the global leader in Fixed price sales.

Just like Kodak became a successful Digital Camera company, eBay feels they can become a successful Fixed Price company, but if eBay doesn't take into consideration the lessons Kodak learned along the way, they are doomed to follow in their footsteps and in a few years they will once again have to revamp their business model, each time moving further and further from their roots.

History is a great teacher, if we actually choose to listen to her. eBay can be a successful Fixed Price leader, but like Kodak not at the profit margins they are used to. There is a reason Amazon is the current leader in the Fixed Price business, they spend money on the "buyer experience" they don't have huge margins because they have exchanged huge profits for huge growth and their whole business model is built on constant innovation. They have a long-term plan and they are aggressively pursuing that goal. eBay, on the other-hand, has a short-term plan and they are aggressively pursuing that goal, the major difference is that eBay will be working on a new plan in a couple of years while Amazon will just continue to innovate.

In my view, eBay has made a fundamental error, they are killing their high margin auction business in favor of a low margin fixed price business, thinking somehow that they can magically make the two co-exist on the same platform-- it isn't possible.So will eBay succeed in changing their model like Kodak did, only to find that their profits are squeezed and investors are still unhappy 1 year from now, or will they step back just for a second and look at some history?

There is certainly a need for change in the eBay business and many of the changes currently being made are correct in theory, but they are based on a fundamental flaw with the business model. Until, that flaw is corrected these changes will not succeed.

What I love about the Internet is that a year from now you will be able to find this post and quickly decide for yourself if I was correct. Is my 12% worth it?

Just my 12%.

Disclosure: none

Comments

[Gotcha:]

What an ignorant author comparing eBay to Kodak. Kodak produced one product for which demand evaporated practically overnight!! EBay has three different main products (eBay, Paypal and Skype) each opertaing in segments experiencing double digit growth.

Some people just like to grab headlines with a bunch of nonsense.

2008 Jun 11 06:04 AM

[Rob Dupea:]

"Product" has become carelessly applied to any service or article sold, thereby blurring the basic distinction between trading in an intangible and peddling a tangible object.

Thus the eBay role of intermediary in multiple marketplaces becomes indistinguishable from Eastman Kodak researching, engineering, manufacturing and marketing a succession of cameras, chemicals, and durable cellophanes, then devising profit-making alternates.

Dependence on a tangible or intangible source for generating sales revenue is as distinct as US Postal Service versus e-mail message delivery.

2008 Jun 11 06:57 AM

[Dinah Balk:]

Disruptive innovation? Is that what they call it when site decisions are based upon nothing more than a coin toss & projected profits?

Or can disruptive innovation best be described as turning a handful of geeks (programmers) loose on a site who couldn't program their way out of a wet paper bag!

But no matter how you define it, disruptive innovation will be the death of ebay as no buyer is going to read a 10 volume set entitled "How To Find What You're Looking For on eBay" and no seller is going to tolerate NO SALES due to disruptive innovation.

2008 Jun 11 06:58 AM

[thanatos:]

Innovate or Die is apt! Site like bidmate.com.au are set to walk all over eBay in the near future. eBays futile attempts at copying sites like Amazon will fail and by that time it will be all over for them.

One of the attractions of the original eBay was it's friendliness, but that is all gone now and all that springs to mind when someone mentions then now is who was screwed and by how much, and I'm not talking about the products, I'm talking about the Sellers and the Buyers.

2008 Jun 11 07:23 AM

[Cable:]

There are so many eBay sellers that are so fed up with eBay they are just salivating at the chance to successfully take their business elsewhere. A few friends and I have all been long time sellers on eBay with good success. But the time is ripe to jump ship due to the ridicules changes that eBay has instituted with their pricing and feedback policies. We are just waiting for a decent looking vessel to climb aboard.

2008 Jun 11 07:53 AM

[redbaron:]

Ebay is stumbling, and others will be there to pick up their loss of business unless they are quick to realize the errors they are making.
I have shorted the stock successfully in the past, and am considering doing that again. This may well be the right time.

2008 Jun 11 07:53 AM

[hybrid79:]

It's an interesting view. I agree that incorrect innovation is dangerous. "disruptive innovation" can quickly become "destructive innvation". eBay's competitors are learning and gaining from ebay's "destructive innovation". When you push a dog to the corner, it's gonna fight their way out. When you push your key customer (i.e. seller), they are going to find a way to survive. In this case, they will move to different business models or change venue to other sites such as Oztion.com.au, Amazon or start their own web sites.

2008 Jun 11 08:22 AM

[leapingcat:]

Disruptive innovation takes place within a company when it responds to a change in technology which replaces one technology with a new one, rather than a development of the old; the Kodak examples are very good ones.
Disruptive innovation is NOT ditching a proven method of operation to copy that of a well-established competitor who just happens to be more successful, as Ebay seems to be doing. If I had the spare cash, I would be investing in Kodak; it might be risky, but there is at least a possibility of a significant gain, as opposed to a comapny which is slowly and steadily spiralling downwards

2008 Jun 11 08:45 AM

[User 153301:]

This is why he hates Ebay:Tech BeatBig eBay Seller Vanishes
Posted by: Rob Hof on February 06
Just a few months ago, Glacier Bay DVD was crowing about becoming one of eBay’s very top sellers, with the highest positive customer feedback rating of any merchant on the marketplace. Today, despite having amassed some 268,199 feedback ratings from customers over more than six years on eBay, it’s gone. Or as they say in eBay parlance, NARU’d—“No longer A Registered User”—which can mean everything from merchants simply quitting to eBay kicking them off for not paying bills or getting too many complaints. (Update: eBay says it can’t comment on why Glacier Bay is now NARU, but a spokesperson says it was eBay that took the action.)

What happened? eBay’s online forums are buzzing with mostly uninformed speculation, but maybe only owner Randy Smythe knows for sure. And he’s not talking. The phone number on his domain registration for glacierbaydvd.com, which is now a blank page, is out of service, and he hasn’t returned an email request for an interview. The auction news site Auctionbytes, which just reported the disappearance, apparently wasn’t successful in reaching Smythe either.

But gleanings from the eBay community indicate that the merchant had been struggling for some time to contend with a glut of new entrants into media products. …

Although sudden disappearances of large sellers from eBay appear fairly rare, they're not unknown as eBay grows and attracts more and more sellers. (Another top seller, electronics merchant BuyEssex, was NARU'd sometime last year.) Indeed, some observers believe that while the exit of large sellers can't be construed as a good thing, turnover generally is inevitable and even healthy for the marketplace: It may be an indication that new sellers, bringing more efficient techniques, are continuing to try eBay. "For every seller who goes out of business, there's 10 to fill the void," says Scot Wingo, CEO of ChannelAdvisor, whose selling services Smythe used. "Where there's demand, supply will find it."

Wingo wouldn't comment on Glacier Bay DVD specifically because of that relationship. But he said a number of large DVD sellers on eBay are now offering auctions that start at rock-bottom prices, then charging higher shipping to make up for the loss on those auctions. That, he says, has made it tough for merchants trying to sell the DVDs themselves at a reasonable profit. Smythe told me the same thing about seven months ago, vowing to move more of his business from eBay to his own Web site as a result.

Wingo believes that shipping problem may ease when eBay Express, a new method of selling on eBay that's more like traditional retail, debuts this spring with pricing that includes shipping automatically. But Wingo, and other eBay sellers, think the make-it-up-on-shipping practice has conditioned bidders to expect lower prices.

In any case, that's not the only problem Glacier Bay may have run into. Jay Senese of Jayandmarie, a CD and DVD merchant who is also one of eBay's largest, thinks that Glacier Bay contracted with media distributors such as Baker & Taylor, Ingram, and Super D to drop-ship DVDs and therefore didn't have complete control of inventory availability. Indeed, a review of Glacier Bay's eBay feedback page indicates an escalating number of negative ratings blamed on nondelivery of merchandise. Senese, who says his business is still doing well, says he stocks his own merchandise so he can guarantee he has a product in stock.

Does the disappearance of such a large seller portend troubles for eBay? Not by itself. Actually, the large sellers I've talked to recently seem a little more sanguine about eBay lately than they had been earlier last year, when fee hikes ticked off many of them. One recent fee hike was tempered by some fee drops in other areas. Sellers report communication lines seem to be more open these days. And some large sellers seem excited about eBay Express's potential.

Still, with a lot of balls in the air, such as the recent acquisition of Skype, eBay will have its hands full. With competition intensifying from the likes of Google, eBay can't afford to lose too many of its marquee merchants.

Full disclosure: The reason I noticed Glacier Bay DVD had disappeared is that I bought a CD from the company in early January. Despite a claim that it had shipped, I still have not received it. Nor have I received a response from the company asking what happened. Before realizing the merchant had stopped doing business on eBay, I also filed claims with both PayPal and buySAFE, mostly as an experiment to see what would happen. Those claims are pending.

2008 Jun 11 08:48 AM

[CEP:]

""For every seller who goes out of business, there's 10 to fill the void," says Scot Wingo, CEO of ChannelAdvisor, whose selling services Smythe used. "Where there's demand, supply will find it." "

Wingo is a wingnut. Buy.com has over a half a million listings running right now. Overpriced in comparison to the same Items on Amazon. Thats the new type of seller their attracting or courting. Their sell through rate is under 3%, what a joke. They obviously arent paying listing fee's. Well maybe if their going for bankruptcy. ebay is killing the golden goose when they shove the small sellers out. I never went to ebay for new widgets I could get locally, cheaper and without postage.

2008 Jun 11 09:01 AM

[Marty:]

Randy interesting comparison. It is funny you chose Kodak. A simple well done commercial showed me their recent turnaround and I think they have finally "got it". As an aside Ebayers should check out there advertised special to hook you into their new product at kodakoffer.com. Seems like a great deal that even I (with 4 printers already cant turn down LOL)

While I agree with some of what you say about Ebay. I think the innovation is closer than they think and the problems different than you think.

I do not think the new emphasis on fixed price will kill the higher margin auction business. I think in the long run it will help improve auctions to be just for those items that belong on auction , which will benefit everyone. I see some huge positives, some things they are missing and some mistakes.

Positives..

1- STORES BACK IN CORE-Moving back towards stores in core search with the new Italy model making store items 30 days fixed price items for store like insertion fees based on store subscription level.

2- INTERNATIONAL EXPOSURE-(Randy dive into this one on your blog)- This is a total homerun and I almost missed some of the reasons it would be. Stage one our ebay.com items can be promoted on the UK site. Our intl sales have really picked up, but we are also getting better regional indexing in search engines AND there are people that hop around ebay sites that find our stuff on the UK site, like ebay.it buyers and others. If this program expands, this will ping-pong people all over the place in terms of buyers and items. It is really working and Id love to share some stats with you for review.

MISSING...

1- EBay Local - After announcing this program at Ebay Live they died on it. Currently shop online pick up in person is the fastest growing area of the internet leading players like Walmart.com and others with 40% plus growth rates. While not perfect for all Ebayers all of Ebays properties play right into this idea. From Stubhub's tickets to larger local items to vehicles , educational specialists and trading assistants , the time for local hubs has returned. In my opinion they are missing a huge opportunity that an Amazon cant match.

MISTAKES...

1- DSR/FEEDBACK - While it is clear there have been some positives from the DSR/Feedback changes I think the effects on the community have been devastating in many cases. I also think the goal to show more differentiation of sellers is really not being met.
For example, sellers that worked hard and had 99.9 percent feedback ratings, found their nuetrals become negatives in the calculations and a new 98.4 percent rating. That does nothing to discourage buyers but has upset that seller. Second, and this is something Id love your opinion on. Buyers seem to buy more items from larger sellers with lower DSRs and lower feedback despite the search exposure decrease they are supposed to get. In looking over some stats it seemed to me that (as reported by others) larger sellers fell in the bottom 50-60% of Ebay sellers in DSRs and in feedback and not only had high sales but the fastest increasing sales. This shows me that buyers really dont care all that much if someone has a 4.9 or a 4.6 or 99.9 or 98.5 feedback. I worry that the effect on the community is just another thing that is forcing people off the site. Its not one thing its many things over time. I want those people here as they are providing diversity of items and they are also buyers.

Thanks for your thoughts on things.

Marty

2008 Jun 11 09:44 AM

[Patricia013:]

I think there is nothing quite so bad or so cheesy as a cheap imitation. If it tries to look like Amazon, act like Amazon and sell like Amazon....it must be Ebay! (Ebay....your nose is brown) LOL

Okay - Ebay is the leader in auctions - globally. Instead of building on that they seem intent on killing it or bungling the site to the point where sellers just leave because they can't take their greedy eyes off Amazon's success and profits.

When it comes to selling on ebay the main problem is the interference of Ebay itself - I think just about every seller would say they could conduct their business much better and make more sales if Ebay got the h*ll out of the way. It seems just about every day Ebay comes out with another rule that ties a seller's hands. Maybe...just maybe then ebay could find the time to police the really bad sellers and buyers who are running rampant and ignored on that site!!!

If Ebay wanted more fixed price listings - then why not simply push Buy It Now! Take the darned fee off using BIN and maybe reduce fees on BIN listings. Give a little Ebay - everyone has to spend money to make money. Don't be like the spoiled child who wants it all and wants it NOW with no regard to the steps in between. They treat sellers like the dirt under their feet until almost every seller has a special hate for them. I know of no other business that alienates its customers the way Ebay does. I think most of us hope for ebay's utter and complete failure. I dream of a day when everyone of the present band of ebay suits is applying for unemployment!

2008 Jun 11 12:24 PM

[John Pseudonym:]

So many mistakes at ebay.

They are forcing out small sellers and they are leaving on an ugly note. A lot of sellers are buyers too, so now you have less sellers and buyers.

Ebay is nuts; like the internet needs 2 Amazons.

---------------

Instead of all these ridiculous "Disruptive Innovations", eBay should have put it's full weight into stopping scams.

Scams and sellers selling junk to unsuspecting buyers are the biggest problems and the #1 reason I haven't bought anything in 2 years after years of buying at least once a week.

I now shop at Amazon, Buy.com and Overstock. Use Craigslist a lot too.

I find that eBay is the LAST place I look for something. And when I do look there, it's solely a price check. Is an honest merchant offering it for less than what I've found so far? 99% of the time the answer is no!

Does this chart look promising to you?

www.medved.net/ebayper...

2008 Jun 11 12:39 PM

[John Pseudonym:]

<img src="www.medved.net/ebayper..." alt="">

2008 Jun 11 12:40 PM

[John Pseudonym:]

I love this...WallyWorld is invading ebay's turf...Time for more "Disruptive Innovations"?

eBay's Donayahoo is such a loser.

2008 Jun 11 02:14 PM

[John Pseudonym:]

online.wsj.com/article...

2008 Jun 11 02:14 PM

[CEP:]

"Instead of all these ridiculous "Disruptive Innovations", eBay should have put it's full weight into stopping scams."


Wouldn't it be refreshing if ebay actually caught someone without users making numerous complaints before action is taken or the police enter the picture. They have never been pro-active about scams on either side of the transaction. Either way they get their cut.

I held on hoping the bigheaded, pigheaded man in charge saw this wasn't working. Today the leak that ebay will soon collect a % of the postage of a transaction has nailed it shut for me.

2008 Jun 11 05:09 PM

[Et tu, Brute!:]

Wow. ebay stock keeps dropping and we haven't hit full summer stride yet.

2008 Jun 11 07:41 PM

[sparkklejar:]

I disruptively Innovated myself to etsy and took my best buyers with me. My profit margin is higher and my buyers a higher caliber. I actually experience customer service from my online sales venue and I am totally thankful to eBay for their current agenda of self destruction. Without their new CEO's (lack of) business tact, I would have never been motivated to dusrupt myself to innovate upward. I suppose eBay will notice in a year that their only sellers dropship toasters and cell phones. I'd like to say by then, redemption will be too late, but in all honesty, It's already too late. It makes no business sense to pay astronomical fees to make no money and be abused.

2008 Jun 11 09:31 PM

[Et tu, Brute!:]

Check out these two threads! Australia has a backbone:

www.auctionbytes.com/c...

www.auctionbytes.com/c...

2008 Jun 12 10:28 AM

[Henrietta:]

@ User 153301
Congratulations on learning how to use Google, you should be very proud of your achievement.

You are mistaken, Randy does not 'hate' eBay. He is a businessman who built an enterprise on a flawed platform.

Yes, Randy failed on eBay and then took what he had learned & clawed his way back up again. I am sure he learned more from the experience than someone who has never achieved anything in the first place.

What is more to the point is that he has been generous enough to share with those who are capable of learning from his experiences.

What have you built?

2008 Jun 12 01:39 PM

[Et tu, Brute!:]

While working online I peeked in on ebay, got to sifting around there and at other sites and threads as well as this one, and the verdect is pretty much the same; eBay has turned into a slaughterhouse of its sellers! Suspended accounts, frozen Paypal accounts, ebay and buyer threats galore, rogue buyers, ransom feedback, non payers, dsr ring-around, and on and on ... it is a nightmare over there!

2008 Jun 12 08:49 PM

[VA:]

"sell through rate is under 3%" - what a total bullshit! where did you get it from, 'CEP'? or perhaps you meant 30%?

Anyways, if the things were as bad as some describe, eBay would have hardly been able to operate and even post any increase in profits & revenues. Some sellers leave? Well, from what I understand that was the intention - to make some (dishonest, lousy) sellers leave. Now, they are back on various forums with 'doomsday' predictions. No wonder - it probably hurts. But eBay finally got the message - it's all about buyers, not sellers anymore.

2008 Jun 13 01:08 AM

[KMD:]

I just received pictures from my daughter via e-mail...called share your pictures. I like the old fashioned way, where pictures are developed, shared in person then framed.
Though the new way is novel, there is a lack of depth and meaning, that the old ways still have for human beings.

With ebay it'll be the same. When users go to ebay and find they no longer recognize it, they will eventually stop using it's services, (all of them including PayPal, StumbleUpon and Skype) Without the core auction business alive there will be no one to use the other services and ebay will have a fractured identity, with no depth or meaning or unique fun, which is ebay's soul. ebay will turn into just another huge conglomerate slumming it's way along in the commonplace e-commerce universe. There will be nothing unusual about ebay and I doubt it will shine like a star bringing in the billions of dollars it used to generate.

I think donohoe with his disruptive innovation was very confused when he messed with the magical core. Dos he know ebay can never, but never be brought alive again?

Disruptive innovation is just a voguish term donohoe got from a professor. And the prof had no understanding of what ebay was and what he was dealing with. Sometimes a certain term to describe a formula to innovate business cannot apply as one size fits all. There was only one ebay and ebay has died now.

2008 Jun 13 04:19 AM

[ost:]

Simply put --

A comparison between Kodak and eBAY is an apple and acorn comparison -- they are not even fruits --

eBAY is a service provider - PERIOD -- Despite some imaginary dream turned nightmare within management eBAY is not a retailer - (except possibly via their eBAY store which breaks many of the rules that they blanket other sellers with) --

eBAY is has a closer kinship to the owner of a street market than to any other business model -- They basically rent cyber real estate to peddlers -- and what hasve in effect is an old tyme Turkish Market where on can find most anything -- Its alleys populated with every seller imaginable - from large organized trader to small ma and pa selling some hand made or found stuff

This actuality is a far cry from traditional retail where the purveyor of goods sells a product to the end user -- That transaction takes place between the eBAY seller and the consumer -- eBAY is in fact a third party to what is really a two party contract --

Until eBAY comes to terms with what IT is - IT will continue to flounder for identity -- The process is being made all the more difficult because someplace along the line it seems that eBAY management became ashamed of what they in fact are

eBAY is becoming a marginalized player because of a management team that refuses to embrace the very thing that is eBAY's greatest strength -- as a result --

eBAY is fast reaching a tipping point from which it will be very difficult to recover -- They may have already past it

Carl

2008 Jun 14 07:56 AM

[laurencole:]

Ebay tried 2 platforms with eBay express. I don't know if Ebay express is successful. It seems that since 2004 eBay has been copying less successful models.
With the new feedback system of neutrals equaling negatives in the sellers ratings, eBay has made it's sellers look bad and is inadvertantly on it's way to making the whole site look as if it's full of untrustworthy sellers. Imagine a retailer, if that's what they plan to be, posting all of their customers complaints on the back label of each product.
They should have gone straight to the source of crooked sellers and supended them for good.

2008 Jun 14 07:12 PM

[blondie:]

Ebay is nothing more than a HUGE monopoly! They feel they have the right to dictate every move their sellers make, while trying to gain more trust from their buyers. Ebay has done the exact opposite! First, they are not your buyers, they are MY buyers. Taking away someones right to leave feedback, yet allowing the buyer to leave any type of feedback they feel is appropriate is slowly backfiring on Ebay. And if the feedback changes or the outrageous fee's don't get you, just wait, PAYPAL WILL!!! Being a Power Seller myself and selling over $16,000 a month, I found myself paying $3,000+ a month in Ebay fee's and another $7,000 a month in PAYPAL'S NEW 21 DAY HOLDS!!! To make this short and sweet, the $7,000+ that Paypal held, they can issue refunds to those buyers. I REFUSE TO SHIP MERCHANDISE THAT I HAVEN'T BEEN PAID FOR, PERIOD!! EBAY AND PAYPAL'S NEW 21 DAY HOLDS ARE NOTHING MORE THAN A SCAM!!! Basically, they say they will hold the funds for 21 days or until you receive positive feedback, BUT IF YOU SO MUCH AS BREATH WITHIN THAT 21 DAY PERIOD, GUESS WHAT?? EBAY AND PAYPAL NOW HAVE THE RIGHT TO HOLD YOUR FUNDS FOR UP TO SIX MONTHS. ISN'T THIS FUN?? When I refused to ship items that Paypal held the funds for, Ebay then suspended me. The same day, Ebay and Paypal sent emails to every customer telling them to file a dispute and request a refund. Several of my customers emailed me this email and it disgusts me! Being a Power Seller, I sold up to 100+ items week. So, now I have almost 100 sellers that have paid for items that will never be shipped to them. What is even worse, when I log in to Paypal I now see they have released some of the funds that were on hold and didn't refund the customer. Why? Paypal and Ebay now say I owe them over $11,000.00 and my response to that is "NO, NO, NO EBAY AND PAYPAL, I WOULD NEVER KEEP YOUR MONEY, I'M JUST HOLDING IT FOR 21 DAYS. THIS IS BETTER FOR YOU AND WILL HELP YOUR CUSTOMERS TO FEEL SAFE. IF YOU BREATH DURING THIS 21 DAY PERIOD, IM SORRY TO SAY I WILL HAVE TO KEEP THE FUNDS FOR UP TO SIX MONTHS OR UNTIL THE MATTER IS RESOLVED. YOU WILL SEE IN THE FUTURE THIS WORKS BETTER FOR ALL THE EBAY SELLERS AND BUYERS. How does it feel Ebay and Paypal? You will not get a dime from me, ever! If anyone knows of a class action suit that has been filed please let me know and I will be one of the first to jump on board!! No more will Ebay or Paypal take advantage of me, my customers or MY MONEY!!

HEADS UP-
If you have a Bank of America account, watch out because Paypal uses Bank of America. If you try to contest the charges that Ebay and Paypal will try to take from your account once you have been suspended, it will be a lot harder because BOA is PRO-EBAY and Paypal. In my opinion, they are all three scum of the earth!! You can Google Bank of America, Paypal and Ebay and you will get page after page after page of complaints! Be careful!!
Blondie

2008 Jun 28 06:32 AM

[o.c.d.colle...:]

Ebay's stock price should speak for itself, now. Ebay was ALREADY a disruptive innovation in an of itself. What it needed was NOT disruptive innovation again, but SUSTAINING innovation. In addressing the customers, they needed to address the REAL customers, the sellers! Without the auction sellers, they will have no magnet to draw buyers in. Ebay does not deliver a good product to it's sellers, the folks they sell space to.

They should have built UP the auction business by separating it from the "buy it now" model. and they needed to eliminate the sniping software on the site for bidding, because that was the source that created the unhappy bidders who were unable to compete and "win" auctions. The long time sellers who made the site what it is today should have been grandfathered in without having the ratings. Obviously, if they were with ebay for so long, they are worth keeping. The fact that ebay alineated it's best and most prolific antique sellers was the biggest mistake they could have ever made.They will live to regret it.

The NEW disruptive innovator is worthpoint, and their acquisitions will take every last bit of ebay's auction business away, never to return, because the business will not be based on just profits, but the socialization of collecting and finding unusual and rare goods. That USED to be ebay's initial attraction and what made it such a huge success. Anyone can shop online at a discount retail site. They are everywhere, ad nauseaum. Ebay can now sit back and watch the antiques and collectibles business sellers AND buyers, run out the door.

2008 Oct 03 09:15 AM