I seem to be finding A LOT of whites at the thrift store lately.
With HALF PRICE tags, no less!!
They seem to practically FLY off the shelf and into my cart when they are half price!
NO such thing as TOO many white dishes though, eh?
I can always just take them to my booth at Stars and sell them ‘as is’.
And I just ADORE having this aqua shelf unit FILLED with white dishes!
And the white DO dishes sell VERY well like that.
Which is WHY I can so easily justify buying so many of them!
Finding a lot of matching dinner and side plates. Funny how the colors look different in that picture?!?! They really ARE the same color!
Making them into cake pedestals seem to be quite popular on etsy.
And I do have a few of the cloche tops in my current stash.
What I always get ‘stuck on’ in regards to selling stuff like THIS on etsy, is the PACKING and SHIPPING though. The pedestal plates WITH a cloche top won’t fit into the largest priority mail box with sufficient packing materials to ship and arrive fully in tact!
Same issue with the 2 tier ones like this. Now I COULD take them to a FedEx or UPS store to be ‘packed and shipped’ . . . but THAT cost would be as much as (if not MORE!) than what I’d charge for the stand itself! Plus, it’s nearly an hour round trip to the NEAREST facility for me; so I’d have to make the trip on my ‘regular errand day’ OR charge for gas.
I see quite a few of the ‘double decker’ plates, like this on etsy; without the base pedestal. I don’t like them like this AT ALL. It’s just not BALANCED. It just looks like 2 plates stuck together. Okay, I KNOW that is what it IS, but it’s SUPPOSED to look like it was ‘meant to be’ . .. not just slapped together.
I’d REALLY love to do a ‘set’ along these lines (but with white china dishes. This set from etsy is WOOD; AND comes with a $50.00 SHIPPING cost on top of the $135.00 cost of the set!) BUT with the aforementioned conundrum regarding the shipping issues, WHAT IF I offered it ‘UNassembled’???
I could certainly offer ‘more for the money’ selling them unassembled. Less chance of breakage in transit too! But the question is, will customers want to pay for a box of components that they have to put together themselves, for the sake of SAVING a significant amount of money???
I could take pictures that SHOW how it looks assembled. I’d tell them what kind of adhesive to use on them. And I could pretty much sell a set of FIVE unassembled pedestals for what it would cost to just SHIP one assembled 2 tier, or dome topped pedestal!
The ‘hot market’ for these items seems to be wedding dessert buffets. And it seems like there are a lot of brides on a budget these days then ever before. And more and more are doing a lot of their own decorations etc . . .
Soooooooooooooo . . taking ALL THAT into consideration, should I give the ‘assemble your own’ listing a try??? (I’ve really got NOTHING to lose; because I can still use all the components elsewhere/otherwise if they don’t sell) I just don’t want shoppers to look at the listing and think, “Well THAT’S a stupid idea! If I want to MAKE it myself I’ll just go out and BUY the plates myself and save even more!”
OR would they gladly pay for the convenience of the already matched and thought out set?? As opposed to spending a lot of their time searching thrift stores and estate sales for the right pieces.
I’m really ON THE FENCE on this! What do YOU think??
AJ's Trash2Treasure BLOG 
Well, That’s something to think about. I’m sure there are people that are much more willing to pay a lot of shipping cost instead of assembling it themselves but at the same time there will be even more people (possibly on budgets) that are very much ok with assembling it themselves if it means they are able to buy something they really like. I guess you can compare it with the people who shop at Ikea and those who hate shopping there. Why not try it out? The way I see it you have nothing to loose and you could offer an complete set with the high shipping cost aswell as the “do-it-yourself-sets” so that they can compare the difference themselves. The way I see it: if you can save a decent amount of money them most people are willing to. If not, they can pay for the extra costs. Just try it!
My suggestion sell it assembled, even with the $50 shipping cost above the price of the set itself. I am a customer service rep. for a window blind vendor, in my eleven years of experience in this industry, customers just do not like to have to assemble product, that they spend money on, they want it fully assembled right out of the box. Keep up the wonderful work that you do, I love looking at pics of your shop at Stars, if I lived in your area I would patronize it. I really like seeing all your great re-do’s of furniture, and decorative pieces. You’re amazing in your creative ideas!
Find your own boxes, pack them well and you can still ship it priority.
TIME is money too. I do not have time to run all over town (or the money to spend on GAS! to do so!) looking for the right size box; nor do I have the space to store a stash of boxes for future use. I also do not have on hand, nor room to store it IF I could afford to buy it in bulk, the appropriate packing materials for fragile items. Packing with newspaper would make it crazy heavy and right back to the high price to ship dilemma. HENCE, my conundrum . . .
aj