$1 Million in Sales at 19: He Did It on eBay!

[DeletedUser394]

http://smallbusiness.aol.com/grow/o...sales-at-19-he-did-it-on/20060518143909990001

I was looking at the results of a poll....the question was simple "are you a millionaire?"

a. Yes - and loving it!
b. Not there yet.
c. No, but I will be!
d. Not in this lifetime.

25% of people responded "d"...they are just setting themselves up for a lifetime of mediocrity and failure (with respects to finances). Adopt a winning attitude, and develop your plan. :smxA:

 

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[andviv]

Three interesting facts I noticed:

1. He's just lucky (I really hate this comment)
From the subtitle of the article:
This lucky entrepreneur found eBay success with a product he knew would always be in demand.

2. The will, $400 and a mentor is all it took for him to make it. It does not sound that complicated, does it?

3. He focused in just one product, mastered it, and then expanded. But only after making it with stroller he expanded to a related product that he understood. Oh, and by the way, the product was not what he liked (I can assure you his 'dream' was NOT to sell strollers) but he understood the market and provided something that he thought was a need: "The one thing I did know is babies are born every day, so people need strollers."

Great finding, thanks for sharing.

 

[fanocks2003]

Three interesting facts I noticed:

1. He's just lucky (I really hate this comment)
From the subtitle of the article:
This lucky entrepreneur found eBay success with a product he knew would always be in demand.

2. The will, $400 and a mentor is all it took for him to make it. It does not sound that complicated, does it?

3. He focused in just one product, mastered it, and then expanded. But only after making it with stroller he expanded to a related product that he understood. Oh, and by the way, the product was not what he liked (I can assure you his 'dream' was NOT to sell strollers) but he understood the market and provided something that he thought was a need: "The one thing I did know is babies are born every day, so people need strollers."

Great finding, thanks for sharing.

Business is one part luck and one part doing it. Sometimes you notice demand for strange things. The better question here is: How much of that $1 million sales number was pure profit? Sales is one thing, but making a profit the step after. The step that separates your from the boys to be horrible:smx2:. The reality is that many people can make million dollar sales, but many people can also be making horribly big losses as well when doing these sales numbers.

 

[Cowxq]

Great story helpful to all us trying to put our feet in the water for the first time through ebay

 

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[kidgas]

I like to think of luck as the intersection between preparedness and opportunity. That being said, I believe you can create your own luck.

 

[lightning]

http://smallbusiness.aol.com/grow/o...sales-at-19-he-did-it-on/20060518143909990001

I was looking at the results of a poll....the question was simple "are you a millionaire?"

a. Yes - and loving it!
b. Not there yet.
c. No, but I will be!
d. Not in this lifetime.

25% of people responded "d"...they are just setting themselves up for a lifetime of mediocrity and failure (with respects to finances). Adopt a winning attitude, and develop your plan. :smxA:

Its amazing just how out of realm being a "millionaire" is to so many people. That was always a huge difference between me and my friends. Theyd buy an issue of car and driver to drool over the dream cars they would "never" own someday, while Id buy the same issue and start getting fired up about which ones I was GOING to own. I have always had huge aspirations, and I have always found it amusing that so many of my family members find the thought of being "rich" to be nothing more then a dream.

 

[Z5 FILMS]

$1MM is gross sales means nothing. I just want to hear about net profits. You can do $1MM in gross sales and be losing lots of money.

 

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[Redshft]

$1MM is gross sales means nothing. I just want to hear about net profits. You can do $1MM in gross sales and be losing lots of money.

:iamwithstupid: Or just make a small profit. I understand he is doing something, he has to be to have hired 5 employees and switch to doing it full time. But that doesn't mean he is making more money than the 20 year old down the street working as a manager at the local grocery store. I just see that he owns a full time job where he could or could not be making a great living.

Kudos to him for observing a demand and market and capitalizing on it.

 

[andviv]

I wonder how many of those criticizing and putting this guy down have sold $1MM. Even if he is making a 5% profit he is making $50K at age 19 AND getting a lot of experience. But yes, it is easier to put him down than see what he has done well and learn from it.

And what if his margin is 7%? or just 10%? It is not uncommon to have a 10% to 20% in these types of products, especially when selling the volume he is selling and getting better pricing from the manufacturers.

 

[fanocks2003]

I wonder how many of those criticizing and putting this guy down have sold $1MM. Even if he is making a 5% profit he is making $50K at age 19 AND getting a lot of experience. But yes, it is easier to put him down than see what he has done well and learn from it.

And what if his margin is 7%? or just 10%? It is not uncommon to have a 10% to 20% in these types of products, especially when selling the volume he is selling and getting better pricing from the manufacturers.

There is no "critic" against him making a revenue of $1MM. But the real question is always what the "bottom line" is. In business at least. Cudos for him making a revenue of $1MM, absolutly. I will probably make a $1,7MM deal with a swedish bus constrcution company this month. But the real question is: What is my bottom line?:smxF:

 

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[Z5 FILMS]

I wonder how many of those criticizing and putting this guy down have sold $1MM. Even if he is making a 5% profit he is making $50K at age 19 AND getting a lot of experience. But yes, it is easier to put him down than see what he has done well and learn from it.

And what if his margin is 7%? or just 10%? It is not uncommon to have a 10% to 20% in these types of products, especially when selling the volume he is selling and getting better pricing from the manufacturers.

I was not attacking him. I was speaking about the article itself. All I ever see is "$1MM in sales!!" etc, which leads stupid people to think he made $1MM. I'm kinda tired of it. It does not mean anything. Airlines do billions of dollars in sales a year. Yet they are all going out of business. "Gross sales" means nothing.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

I was not attacking him. I was speaking about the article itself. All I ever see is "$1MM in sales!!" etc, which leads stupid people to think he made $1MM. I'm kinda tired of it. It does not mean anything. Airlines do billions of dollars in sales a year. Yet they are all going out of business. "Gross sales" means nothing.

I have to agree as a lot of these articles tout "gross sales" as that is an indication of some sort of success. It isn't. Whenever I read these success stories and they only mention "revenue" or "sales" it leaves me wearily unimpressed.

I could go out and buy $10 million dollars in IPODS, sell them at 50% off and have instant "gross sales" of $5 million dollars, yet have an income statement bleeding red in losses -- zero profit -- gross sales is worthless as an indicator of business success as anyone can underprice the market, make sales, and grow.

The key is creating a net profit worthy of your time invested. If you are selling at a loss how impressive is that?

Basically, you have to take these success story articles with a little bit of skepticism as they aren't mentioning the really important number which is NET INCOME.

 

[TK1]

I wonder how many of those criticizing and putting this guy down have sold $1MM. Even if he is making a 5% profit he is making $50K at age 19 AND getting a lot of experience. But yes, it is easier to put him down than see what he has done well and learn from it.

And what if his margin is 7%? or just 10%? It is not uncommon to have a 10% to 20% in these types of products, especially when selling the volume he is selling and getting better pricing from the manufacturers.

Nobody is hating at him, it's just business 101...A guy selling ebooks grossing 100,000 can make more profit than somebody grossing 1M selling things on ebay for example.

 

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[cants]

you guys really think that that guy would go through all the trouble of selling 1M worth of strollers without being smart enough to get himself some profit?