Since at least one reader has expressed in learning more details about how I’m making money with Amazon FBA I have decided to start a feature where I share the details of an item I’ve sold on Amazon. I’m calling this feature Flippy Friday. There won’t be a post every Friday but I hope to have a post on most Fridays.
The first product sale I will share with you is the John Cena WWE deluxe trainer. This is a toy that I bought back in April and sold in May. I found this product while looking for clearance items at Sears that I could sell for a profit on Amazon. I haven’t had much luck finding products at Sears to sell on Amazon. This product is one of the few items I’ve found to resell from Sears and it was one of my more profitable items. I bought the trainer for $14.97 and I was able to sell it for $54.25. It is rare that I find an item that I can sell for that much of a markup. After deducting the $14.32 in fulfillment fees from Amazon I made a profit of $24.96. Since I also had shipping fees my actual profit was a few dollars less. I don’t keep track of my shipping fees by product, but if I shipped this item by itself it would have cost me about $4 or $5. If I shipped it with other items then this item’s share of the shipping cost would have probably been only about $2. Either way it was a pretty good profit. What makes this an even better deal is the fact that I purchased this item with Shop Your Way points which meant that I effectively paid $0 out of pocket. Although not many items at Sears are normally profitable Amazon flips when you factor in special deals that pay extra SYW points more items become profitable flips. I’ll write more about the SYW program in a later post if anyone is interested.
After making a nice profit and quick sell with this item I went back and bought two more of these trainers. Unfortunately, it appears that many other FBA sellers also bought this item on discount. The price plummeted from $54 to $20. I sold one at $20 which resulted in a $4.44 loss and I still have one more that hasn’t sold yet. This just goes to show that even if you have a product that was previously profitable there is no guarantee that it will remain that way and you have to accept the fact that you will have some losses. Buying a product that has an over 3x markup is a low risk purchase, but it doesn’t eliminate the risk.
If you have any questions about anything in this post or FBA in general please feel free to ask. Although I’m far from an expert on FBA I will share what I do know.
I would hope that if you cannot sell this item, you will at least be in shape from using it. And it looks like a great punching bag, in case you get a case of buyers remorse.
Maybe have it as a prize for some blogging contest. Or give it to a kid.
If I can’t sell the last one I will probably just donate it.
Do you usually just check items that are on clearance? Sears is such a big store that it seems overwhelming trying to identify an Amazon arbitrage.
I usually focus on the clearance items. It generally takes a lot of scanning to find profitable items. I’ve had a little better luck lately at finding things though.
maybe you should just set it aside for awhile until the market becomes unsaturated.
Harley – That probably would have been a good idea. It has already sold for a small loss though.
I have read your blog off and on, but was getting a bit confused if you were an attorney, a tax preparer, student, lived in your van etc. I have now read from the beginning and am all caught up. I have read from the beginning for a few blogs and as soon as I get caught up it seems like they stop writing. I hope you keep writing. I like reading blogs like yours because it keeps me motivated to keep low expenses and a high savings rate.
Kim – Thanks for the nice words. I do plan to keep writing. I’ve been writing this blog for nine years and don’t plan to ever stop. My posting frequency does vary quite a bit depending on what I have going on in my life and how much I feel like writing.