eBay—

Recently I joined 40 plus folks in a 30 person-size room at the Lexington Library for a formal peek at this phenomenon of on-line buying and selling in an auction format.

Ponder this: The company was founded in 1995 and finished the year 2006 with 13 billion (yes, billion) dollars in sales.

At any given time there are likely more than 100 million items available for sale, world-wide of course.

They sell a digital camera every minute.

A fork lift usually goes in about 4 hours.

In August 2006 they sold their two millionth passenger vehicle on line.

The most expensive item ever sold there—a Gulfstream II corporate airplane that went for 4.9 million bucks in August 2001.

They make their money with listing and sales fees—fairly modest ones at that. For example; say you want to sell a digital camera for a $60 asking price. Your “Insertion Fee” to place your ad would be $2.40.

If the item sells, you are charged a final value fee. Using an example from their web site; this camera sells for say, $153. Your final sales fee would be $5.47. Add that to your listing fee of 2.40 and you have a cost of $7.87 to sell your $153 dollar item.

And, the buyer pays shipping fees which are not included in the above sample.

To smooth the flow of dollars from buyer to seller, most folks use a firm called Pay Pal (also owned by eBay). Once registered there, buyers and sellers have a cashless society where transactions are near instant and secure.

I don’t know if they included the Pay Pal fees in the above example but in another sample they indicated a Pay Pal fee of $2.04 on a $52 sale.

Even the US Postal Service has gotten into the action. Recognizing the huge benefit in business from eBay they offer sellers free shipping boxes and, you can purchase and print postage and labels on your home computer.

I feel inspired to go poke around in the attic. But, alas, I do not have one of those.

Just my luck.