As the release of the Brick Classifieds feature nears, we wanted to add a new forum dedicated to it.  This will be the place that we will make announcements and updates regarding Brick Classifieds. One of the first announcements I am going to make is that I am looking for some members that have the time and really want to post on Brick Classifieds.  Overall we are looking for an initial group of people that devote time to help populate the site with real listings.  When we open the site to the rest of group, we want you to be able to see instantly how it will look and feel. I would really like to invite members who have no less than 30-50 sets and/or minifigures that they will be willing to take new photos and put in solid details.  Remember, the #1 rule of this site is that you need to upload at least one real photo of the actual set(s) you will be selling.  No stock photos will be allowed unless accompanied by an actual photo of the item being sold.  We will go over these rules more as I create a Brick Classifieds (Beta) forum to discuss and issues or concerns.

 

The first phase of the release of Brick Classifieds will be mostly about loading the site with listings.  That without a doubt is key to getting the site recognition.  As we have mentioned before all listings will be FREE during a beta period which will probably be a few months long.  Ed and I have had many discussions about what our goal is with this site.  Our overall feelings have been that it should be an extremely easy to use system for posting sets.  Those of you that are familiar with eBay should feel right at home here.  Much of the concept of adding/buying items and posting feedback is almost the same.  It's simple.  Nothing here will blow your mind as far as features go. It's meant to be simple but effective. As time goes on, more features will be added when we feel that they will make the most impact.

 

If you have 30 or more items that you would like to post and have the time to put in solid effort in creating good listings so that everyone can get an idea for what the site will be like, please send me a PM or post in here.  Sometime in the next week or so I will invite you into a Private Beta forum.

 

One special note that we would like to put out there is that we have decided to allow everyone to create a new account.  It will not initially be tied to your Brickpicker account in anyway.  So for those of you that are concerned about all the BS that has been going on, you can start fresh here.  For those of you that don't care about all this, you can use your BP username so that people will know who you are and feel confident.  For many of you I think this can be a huge benefit.   As I open up new features for sales with the Brickfolio, there will be a hook that will tie accounts together privately if you wish.  We will get into this more later, but just wanted to put it out there.

 

Over the next few days, we will talk more about features, show screenshots, etc.  We appreciate you being patient, but hopefully by getting it going now, I can start to get marketing going and help everyone have a great holiday season this year

Maybe we will hire some Oompa Loompas...On a serious note, yes it will be, but eventually, people will build up some positive feedback and we will be able to stop reviewing certain members listings.  Even from the start, there are people who I trust(not you...LOL) and their listings will be approved automatically.  I have seen their eBay and Bricklink stores and their ratings are excellent.  I will talk to Jeff about making some sort of override for members who are willing to show us their feedback on other sites so we can carry it over in some way.  Maybe some sort of badge or emblem indicating an experienced seller.

That's a great idea. I was wondering if current eBay or bricklink feedback would somehow "count" towards a seller's rating and reputation in the classifieds. A badge or award emblem would be one good way to distinguish those who have already built up a solid reputation.

You had me at "badge or emblem". You know how us girls are about shiny stuff. 

That's a great idea. I was wondering if current eBay or bricklink feedback would somehow "count" towards a seller's rating and reputation in the classifieds. A badge or award emblem would be one good way to distinguish those who have already built up a solid reputation.

It's something I would like to incorporate, but I just have to get Jeff to make it happen. 

I think you overestimate the amount of resellers on the site. We have almost 30,000 members and most are silent and probably don't resell LEGO sets. They are here to check out prices and the values of their sets and look for sales on the Daily Deals. They are also here to talk LEGO in general. As Jeff stated above, Bricklink has done very well over the years selling their LEGO sets with poor advertising and awful site features and functionality. Viewing photos on that site is a joke. They do well because they charge a fair fee and LEGO fans know of it. We will actually advertise and Jeff and I have some ideas to promote sales, but we have to get the feature active before we can move on many of these ideas.

If a seller on the Classifieds listed an item at a fair price, why wouldn't you buy from them? If you are the type of seller that likes to list items for way over market value and wait for some uninformed sucker to buy from you, the Classifieds are not for you. Stick with Amazon and eBay and their 10-15% fees and growing regulations and restrictions. But if you like to charge a fair price and pay reasonable fees, then give us a shot.

Sent from my iPad using Brickpicker

 

First, thanks for your reply. I feel that people are not understanding what I am saying. I don't understand why the responses so far are saying things like "so then this is not for you--use Amazon or Ebay." That type of answer tells me the reader did not grasp what I'm saying. It's not that I don't want to have lower fees (who doesn't?) or another avenue for selling (I definitely do want another option for selling) but that there is a major flaw to the concept. Think of this not as me saying "Don't do it!" but as someone calling out a very logical weakness in the design. If it goes ignored then I did my part and it's not my decision. But as a member I will at least let you guys know about it (and honestly, I'm surprised nobody even mentioned it).

 

Also, couple things that struck me from  your post:  

 

1.The Bricklink community is largely for people in the Lego world to the Lego world. It is largely for parter outers to people buying items for MOCs. It is not really geared toward the primary market. Ebay and Amazon (and it sounds like this classified feature as well) is aimed at both the primary and secondary. My honest opinion but I don't think it's an apples to apples comparison to bring in Bricklink to the discussion if you are aiming toward the primary market.

 

2. Hoping for reasonable prices from BPers is going to be a bit optimistic I feel. Again, by nature this community is after profit maximization. Bricklinkers on the other hand mostly is for people who are Lego traders. Lego hobbyists. Bricklink sellers generally have relatively low prices. Can we expect people on this site to do the same? The future is unknown but there is reason to believe that that won't be happening. It's 2 different core audiences: Genuine lego hobbyists/MOCers vs people profiting on Lego. Will this distinction show in the prices? I think it will by nature.

 

Fundamentally I firmly believe it is not a good idea to connect the classified feature, aimed at the primary market, to the Brickpicker forums. To me this is just a bad idea. You're assuming people will be ignorant and stay ignorant. If you connect them together they will find out what our purpose is and the type of sellers that post. I'm not sure how this is not a stumbling block. 

 

It is not that I don't want a classifieds feature--it's that the concept has a very obvious flaw. 

 

With that said, I think I will stay out of the discussion. Best of luck. 

 

My 2cents.   

Silvertt, in my opinion you're wildly under-estimating two things:

 

1) The markup that motivated-to-sell BPers will put on their items. I'm not a cheap date, but I'm not crazy-unreasonable in pricing either (I know this because amongst all the race to the bottom competition on eBay my items still sell, and I'm meeting or exceeding my sales goals on BL, too).

 

Because I have not-cheap but saleable-reasonable pricing, and because I can do a big old whomping price slash of at LEAST 13.39% off my eBay prices (that being what it costs me to sell an item on eBay, PayPal fees not included), I don't doubt that I can sell on Brick Classifieds here if it becomes a viable market with traffic -- I'm perfectly willing to take a shot and see if the Macks can make that happen. I'll be out a few hours time if they don't, not a big deal.

 

2) The convenience fee that ANY buyer, even another investor, is willing to pay to acquire what they want or need. This Christmas I bought as many Star Wars R2 style droids as I could find, on eBay, for my husband who decided to collect them. I paid almost no attention to price as long as it didn't look crazy - a few dollars one way or another didn't worry me. I looked for Top Rated Sellers with great feedback who had 1 day handling and fast (first class or priority) shipping, so that I wouldn't suffer from "didn't get them in time for Christmasitis". I'm not a spendthrift jade, and when it comes to business buying I'm a downright cheapskate, but for personal buying "lowest price" isn't always a god to me - I'm looking for service, reliability, and a in-the-ballpark price.

 

Regardless, the advice to not use the service is valid - if you think it's a waste of your time because you feel it's set up "wrong", wait and see and don't dive in.

Finally!  Count me in for the beta please.

 

I've been a reader the past few months on this site.  I 'registered' today and I used my youtube name.  This way, people will see my name and recognize it and the items I need to sell can be seen in my videos.

Pictures/videos is a MUST if you want to sell.  No one will buy blind.

 

I sold a complete set of Harry Potter lego a few yrs ago.  I took pictures and made a video.  Because the purchase was high dollar, I only accepted a cashier's check.  I actually Skyped with the person who won afterwards so she could see in real time that I did indeed have what she purchased.

Trust is earned.

 

And I would much rather sell my sets here than on ebay.  So thank you for adding this area for us.

First, thanks for your reply. I feel that people are not understanding what I am saying. I don't understand why the responses so far are saying things like "so then this is not for you--use Amazon or Ebay." That type of answer tells me the reader did not grasp what I'm saying. It's not that I don't want to have lower fees (who doesn't?) or another avenue for selling (I definitely do want another option for selling) but that there is a major flaw to the concept. Think of this not as me saying "Don't do it!" but as someone calling out a very logical weakness in the design. If it goes ignored then I did my part and it's not my decision. But as a member I will at least let you guys know about it (and honestly, I'm surprised nobody even mentioned it).

 

Also, couple things that struck me from  your post:  

 

1.The Bricklink community is largely for people in the Lego world to the Lego world. It is largely for parter outers to people buying items for MOCs. It is not really geared toward the primary market. Ebay and Amazon (and it sounds like this classified feature as well) is aimed at both the primary and secondary. My honest opinion but I don't think it's an apples to apples comparison to bring in Bricklink to the discussion if you are aiming toward the primary market.

 

2. Hoping for reasonable prices from BPers is going to be a bit optimistic I feel. Again, by nature this community is after profit maximization. Bricklinkers on the other hand mostly is for people who are Lego traders. Lego hobbyists. Bricklink sellers generally have relatively low prices. Can we expect people on this site to do the same? The future is unknown but there is reason to believe that that won't be happening. It's 2 different core audiences: Genuine lego hobbyists/MOCers vs people profiting on Lego. Will this distinction show in the prices? I think it will by nature.

 

Fundamentally I firmly believe it is not a good idea to connect the classified feature, aimed at the primary market, to the Brickpicker forums. To me this is just a bad idea. You're assuming people will be ignorant and stay ignorant. If you connect them together they will find out what our purpose is and the type of sellers that post. I'm not sure how this is not a stumbling block. 

 

It is not that I don't want a classifieds feature--it's that the concept has a very obvious flaw. 

 

With that said, I think I will stay out of the discussion. Best of luck. 

 

My 2cents.   

 

All I can really say is thank you for you opinion.  Unless you can tell me that you have X-Men powers to see the future, no one really knows what will happen.  Perhaps we are wrong and it will flop. Or we give it 110% effort, people are patient, get results and everyone is a winner.  Give us a chance to market it the way that we feel we want our product to work. Again, no one knows, but we are gong to try.  But for you to come out and say its a very obvious flaw is in my opinion quite arrogant when you don't know the vision we have for this.  Maybe I will resurrect some of the old posts from the first forum where we had plenty of people come on tell us this site will fail and be gone in no time, yet I think we have done a pretty good job of getting interest in the site.  Everyone might not like it, but many people have made/saved money from this site.

I'd be interested, however, I might be slightly under the 30 item mark. Most of my inventory initially would be minifigs until I can complete my sets that I'm so slowly work *** on.

I'm in if y'all will have me.

Im curious about the mods and owners of the site approving the listings only if they are "fair" priced. I am to assume a listing for an SSD right now for 800 or 1,000 would be a no go? I have never heard of a venue having to approve the asking price. I do like a lot of the other ideas and features and think this feature of the site could only be good for people looking to buy and sell Lego which there are a lot of around here already. IMO sellers should be able to ask whatever price they feel is fair or reasonable and buyers can decide to not buy if its priced too high. Fingers crossed

Im curious about the mods and owners of the site approving the listings only if they are "fair" priced. I am to assume a listing for an SSD right now for 800 or 1,000 would be a no go? I have never heard of a venue having to approve the asking price. I do like a lot of the other ideas and features and think this feature of the site could only be good for people looking to buy and sell Lego which there are a lot of around here already. IMO sellers should be able to ask whatever price they feel is fair or reasonable and buyers can decide to not buy if its priced too high. Fingers crossed

I could be wrong, but I think it was more a matter of filtering out scammers, who try to post deals that are "too good to be true" to entice people to buy products they don't really have or don't really intend to ship...

First, thanks for your reply. I feel that people are not understanding what I am saying. I don't understand why the responses so far are saying things like "so then this is not for you--use Amazon or Ebay." That type of answer tells me the reader did not grasp what I'm saying. It's not that I don't want to have lower fees (who doesn't?) or another avenue for selling (I definitely do want another option for selling) but that there is a major flaw to the concept. Think of this not as me saying "Don't do it!" but as someone calling out a very logical weakness in the design. If it goes ignored then I did my part and it's not my decision. But as a member I will at least let you guys know about it (and honestly, I'm surprised nobody even mentioned it).

 

Also, couple things that struck me from  your post:  

 

1.The Bricklink community is largely for people in the Lego world to the Lego world. It is largely for parter outers to people buying items for MOCs. It is not really geared toward the primary market. Ebay and Amazon (and it sounds like this classified feature as well) is aimed at both the primary and secondary. My honest opinion but I don't think it's an apples to apples comparison to bring in Bricklink to the discussion if you are aiming toward the primary market.

 

2. Hoping for reasonable prices from BPers is going to be a bit optimistic I feel. Again, by nature this community is after profit maximization. Bricklinkers on the other hand mostly is for people who are Lego traders. Lego hobbyists. Bricklink sellers generally have relatively low prices. Can we expect people on this site to do the same? The future is unknown but there is reason to believe that that won't be happening. It's 2 different core audiences: Genuine lego hobbyists/MOCers vs people profiting on Lego. Will this distinction show in the prices? I think it will by nature.

 

Fundamentally I firmly believe it is not a good idea to connect the classified feature, aimed at the primary market, to the Brickpicker forums. To me this is just a bad idea. You're assuming people will be ignorant and stay ignorant. If you connect them together they will find out what our purpose is and the type of sellers that post. I'm not sure how this is not a stumbling block. 

 

It is not that I don't want a classifieds feature--it's that the concept has a very obvious flaw. 

 

With that said, I think I will stay out of the discussion. Best of luck. 

 

My 2cents.   

I think your wrong.Most people want to buy a product.If it's a price their willing to pay they will. Why you bought it is irrelevant.WHy should they care if you bough *** to resell or just had a extra one. In fact a reseller will generally give good service and ship quickly be a professional etc. as opposed to bl where some sellers take forever to ship.There are a certain percentage of buyers that may be turned off but they are I think a very small percentage.

As for being overpriced just because you may overprice your listings there are  a ton of people on here who do quick flips and are happy with small returns.

First, thanks for your reply. I feel that people are not understanding what I am saying. I don't understand why the responses so far are saying things like "so then this is not for you--use Amazon or Ebay." That type of answer tells me the reader did not grasp what I'm saying. It's not that I don't want to have lower fees (who doesn't?) or another avenue for selling (I definitely do want another option for selling) but that there is a major flaw to the concept. Think of this not as me saying "Don't do it!" but as someone calling out a very logical weakness in the design. If it goes ignored then I did my part and it's not my decision. But as a member I will at least let you guys know about it (and honestly, I'm surprised nobody even mentioned it).

 

Also, couple things that struck me from  your post:  

 

1.The Bricklink community is largely for people in the Lego world to the Lego world. It is largely for parter outers to people buying items for MOCs. It is not really geared toward the primary market. Ebay and Amazon (and it sounds like this classified feature as well) is aimed at both the primary and secondary. My honest opinion but I don't think it's an apples to apples comparison to bring in Bricklink to the discussion if you are aiming toward the primary market.

 

2. Hoping for reasonable prices from BPers is going to be a bit optimistic I feel. Again, by nature this community is after profit maximization. Bricklinkers on the other hand mostly is for people who are Lego traders. Lego hobbyists. Bricklink sellers generally have relatively low prices. Can we expect people on this site to do the same? The future is unknown but there is reason to believe that that won't be happening. It's 2 different core audiences: Genuine lego hobbyists/MOCers vs people profiting on Lego. Will this distinction show in the prices? I think it will by nature.

 

Fundamentally I firmly believe it is not a good idea to connect the classified feature, aimed at the primary market, to the Brickpicker forums. To me this is just a bad idea. You're assuming people will be ignorant and stay ignorant. If you connect them together they will find out what our purpose is and the type of sellers that post. I'm not sure how this is not a stumbling block. 

 

It is not that I don't want a classifieds feature--it's that the concept has a very obvious flaw. 

 

With that said, I think I will stay out of the discussion. Best of luck. 

 

My 2cents.   

You know, the one thing that I have learned is that change is constant.  You adapt or die.  This site has morphed over the past three years from a "make money" site into a "save money" site.  "A penny saved is a penny earned."  If the site needed a motto, that would be it.  It is a place where any LEGO fan can come and find out about great deals on LEGO sets and items.  Sure, we have the Price Guide and other features, but almost everything on this site is dedicated to saving money, including the Price Guide.  I want members(and future buyers) to be educated about prices and buying and selling LEGO sets.  I want them to learn about the value of LEGO sets and how they appreciate.  Paying the proper price for LEGO sets will keep speculation in check.  If potential buyers know how and why LEGO sets increase in value, maybe it will be easier to pull a trigger on expensive sets and get more people involved in the hobby.

 

People know they have to pay a premium for items that are rare, hard to find, out of stock, out of production, etc...and that is where sites like eBay, Bricklink, Amazon and ours(hopefully) make their profits.  Our intention is to cater and sell to every type of LEGO fan imaginable.  We do not discriminate.  You keep on asking what markets we will sell to.  I say, with all due respect, "Who gives a sh*t?"  It does not matter.  We will sell to everyone with a PayPal account, credit card or check book.  People will find us if prices are fair and sellers are reliable.  We cannot make members price sets properly or ship them correctly, but we can charge sellers a fair commission and limit regulations and restrictions so that they see the value in listing sets with us.  We hope members will respect our game plan and take some of the savings from fees and pass them to buyers.  Peer pressure can also help here as well.

 

I think the main issue that you and some other members have with the Classifieds and the site in general is that we promote the buying and selling of LEGO sets.  This is true and will be true until the site is no more.  The cat is out if the bag and many people now know about the world of LEGO investing.  But even though we promote the buying and selling of LEGO sets to more people than some would like, we also help members save money when doing so.  We will save you money on the Classifieds as well.  It is up to all of you to make this work.  Jeff and I will advertise and find creative ways to promote your sets and improve the site, but all of you sellers will have to deliver in order for this to work.  Is the theory flawed?  We will soon find out...

Ed and Jeff I would love to try it out, If you need more testers. My ebay id is trekgate502 and I have 100% feedback at 480 transactions rated. I'm semi new here but not at ebay.

Just want to take the opportunity, and I know both the Admins and the rest of the Mods think this as well, to thank everyone who has offered to be such an important part of what will probably become one of the most important features of this site. The response has been incredible!

Please count me in.

From a buyers perspective, I am pessimistically optimistic.  I vaguely remember another lego auction site that didn't last long because the prices were too high. If there is deals to be had here, I am all for it.

Ed and Jeff I would love to try it out, If you need more testers. My ebay id is trekgate502 and I have 100% feedback at 480 transactions rated. I'm semi new here but not at ebay.

We would like to fill up the site with a nice variety of sets and minifigures, so we will take quite a few members. We will come up with some sort of notation for experienced/highly rated sellers from other sites like eBay, Bricklink and Amazon. We will ask sellers to supply their seller IDs from other sites and I will check them out and PM them on one of those sites to confirm it's actually them. By doing this, we will be able to streamline the process for us and many sellers that have excellent feedback and experience and don't need to be monitored that closely. It will also help buyers gain some trust in the system.

Sent from my iPad using Brickpicker

There will also be the ability for people to do a basic bio or store description on the site. This is he place to talk about your sales, feedback and experience on other sites.

Sent from my iPad using Brickpicker

I would like to know if there will be an email noticfication feature like bricklink where a potential buys be notified when a seller add a set to sell and the system will allow the seller to notify people who subscribe to that set.

Sent from my SM-N900T using Brickpicker mobile app

I was wondering what you expect from a parted out set like for example I would just sell the Joker steam roller only. Is it ok to use stock photos for that or will we need to build first and take a pic?

Count me. In if you still need volunteers

Count me. In if you still need volunteers

I forgot to mention that I have some Ebay experience (3800 feedback' 100%) and am active on Bricklink as we'll (900 feedback) and I can't wait to give this a try. I have about 2500 sets I can list

Will we have the ability to see sold classifieds so we can gauge what a set or mini-figure is really selling for on the site. This for me helps two fold.  What to price a item at and what I can expect to pay for a item I would want to purchase.  For me the #1 reason I like eBay is that I can look up items and find out there real value. Its sort of turned into the default price guide for anything and everything.   Realistically knowing what I can expect to sell a item for by checking sold items for myself is something that is a incredible resource.  

 

Also with the entire Amazon Disney Frozen Debacle there could come a time when all or most sellers are restricted from selling Lego on Amazon. (Most things Elsa Frozen are now restricted on amazon due to a high amount of counterfeits that infested there warehouses through fba shipments)Those lisitngs would have to be listed somewhere.  If this becomes a viable option then my guess is a fair share would end up here.  

I would like to know if there will be an email noticfication feature like bricklink where a potential buys be notified when a seller add a set to sell and the system will allow the seller to notify people who subscribe to that set.

Sent from my SM-N900T using Brickpicker mobile app

 

This will be part of the upcoming BrickWatcher feature when I release the site update.  It will include search for sets on the classifieds as well.  People will be able to enter in set numbers that they would like specific updates on, select the stores (Amazon, Kmart, Brick Classifieds) price ranges or percents off.  I was working on SMS capabilities that will allow for you to be alerted via email and text message if you register your cell number.