Ebay - Anyone sells their extra plants on Ebay?

I have got rid of extra trees I planted on Ebay by collection only. Anyone else done this or does this regularly?

 

If I were happy to disclose a lot of personal information in setting up an account, I might have considered it.

However, in these days of identity theft, I do feel a tad cautious in setting up accounts in a public domain

Rather do boot fairs

 

I sell seeds & a few plants on Ebay, no problems so far but there are a lot of scams on there.

 

I've sold 1000s of Snowdrops on Ebay and given the proceeds to a local hedgehog sanctuary. Apart from 1 person who said they didn't receive the bulbs (I always get proof of postage!) who I didn't believe but sent replacements FOC to get rid of the hassle I have had no other problems and all recipients left me very nice feedback. I'll probably repeat the process again if I still have plenty of bulbs to spare. I have considered selling the quantities of excess herbaceous I have but the packaging might be a bit tricky and postage prohibitively expensive. I have instead given herbaceous plants to those who run a cat sanctuary and they sell it at car boots. Perhaps I am quite laid back about "mail order" as I ran my own mail order business for many years, long before the likes of Ebay was invented!

 

Local pick up only.

 

I buy a lot of seeds and plants via ebay. I am rarely disappointed and I am generally pleased with the service.
I haven't tried selling plants on there yet but I might give it a go this year.

 

I buy from eBay (often from individuals). The amount of effort that they have put into packaging would put me right off doing it myself ... I don't have that many hours in the day!

I have sold excess Jerusalem Artichoke tubers and Canna seeds, and I probably would sell something like Leek plants (easy to wrap and post)

But I have also heard people saying that they got complains - it wasn't as big as the photo of the fully mature plant in their Auction - of course in such situations the person wants a Refund AND to keep the plant ... I wouldn't want that sort of hassle. I have, already, had people saying they got an empty envelope with no seeds in it. Maybe, but I doubt it. I now have plastic envelop covers to counteract that ... but its all just hassle. If you have enough plants then a car boot sale might be better. No comebacks!

 

Agree wholeheartedly Kristen. Plants are far too subjective as to quality size etc hence why I have stuck to bulbs. No fancy packaging needed and I clearly state I cannot guarantee every flaming bulb will flower in it's 1st year! The recipients also get a very generous amount of extra bulbs. Unfortunately it seems to be quite tricky to even do swaps. My idea of a decent chunk of something and someone else's doesn't always match up. Luckily I have found someone on GC who has similar taste in plants and their idea of a portion of a plant and mine are pretty similar. We've already done 1 swap and intend to do another in the Spring so looking forward to getting about 30 new varieties of herbaceous and they likewise the only cost being transport. A good solution all round especially for my bank balance which has taken a pounding due to the purchase of a new large greenhouse!

 

I have had nice plants from Ebay so I would be disappointed if everyone gave up selling them because it was too difficult.

Some of the brugmansia sellers must make quite a nice bit of money in a season from their horticultural skills - well worth having.

I have sold a few plants but ran into trouble when I had to post some Solanum lacciniatum seedlings to a late-payer in a frantically busy and stressful week. They are very soft and would be hard to post safely so I decided to cancel the sale, seeing as they hadn't paid anyway and maybe weren't going to, and I just didn't have the time to find all the packaging and do a proper job. Had a bit of a row over that one and I haven't tried since.

I might try again but stipulate pick-up only. Or, stick to tough, leathery plants that will tolerate being stuck in a box for several days.

@silu, proof of posting will get you nowhere in the event of a non-arrival dispute. Unless you have a tracking number from a courier or RM Ebay will take the side of the buyer and force you to refund, no matter how much you protest that you have a Proof of Posting slip. I had an issue over this last summer, and another one today. I would like Ebay to publish the figures for each buyer as to how often they do this as I think some buyers operate it as a scam. I now post any item which sells for more than a tenner by courier or with a signed-for service, which adds to the cost of postage. Another example of a few bad eggs spoiling things for the many honest ones.

 

I sell mine via Facebook.

 

My only gripe is that I sometimes scour ebay for what I want and find that it is collection only and too far away for me to get to. I do completely understand why some people go for collection only though.

 

You can limit eBay searches to X miles from a given postcode - if that would help?

Buty you can't search for "X miles from a given postcode ONLY IF IT IS COLLECT" :(

 

I produced loads of extra plants over the past 2 years to raise funds for my daughter's World Challenge Trip but sold them cheaply at car boots @ 3 for £1 for the cheaper stuff and 50p each for something a bit more special. As I can get free, used 70mm pots (& trays) in thousands, plus seek out really cheap compost, we still made a really good profit which helped raise the £5,000 required for the trip.

 

I've sold quite a few plants on Ebay, my wife likes growing lemon, orange and grapefruit pips, we sell them as seedlings when they reach about 3-6" in height. Over the last 2 years we've sold 100+ and never had a single complaint, the key is to be as honest and accurate with your description as you can be, in this case we always emphasize that being seed grown they might never fruit and if they do it could be quite a few years off and then they may not be of edible quality. It made little difference and they sold like hot cakes, even had someone buy 20+ plants off us in France!!!