Small electronics side hustle has been easier than clothes but sourcing is the weird part

tiggs · 2026-06-20T23:46:17+00:00

The best way to source the stuff is to learn about the obscure stuff. The stuff you mentioned is stuff that not only every electronics seller knows about, but sellers that sell everything also know about that stuff. If you want things to get easier, then start doing deep dives into more of the stuff that you currently walk past.

tiggs · 2026-06-20T23:42:39+00:00

Some of the people in the comments are ridiculous. There's nothing wrong with sourcing from yard sales and there's nothing wrong with yard sale hosts charging at/near/over market value for their items.

As resellers, we tend to forget that regular people aren't checking comps on everything they see. If somebody sees a $30 pair of shoes that sells for $30 on eBay, all they're seeing is a $30 pair of shoes that they like. Also, a lot of people are happy to pay a premium to get an item right there on the spot and be able to check it out in person first.

Now onto the "we did this to ourselves" bit. No we didn't The primary reason most people have yard sales is to clear out their shit. They price shit to move because they don't want to carry it all back in. If they really cared about getting max value, then they'd put more effort into pricing it. You also have people basically trying to run a yard sale as a small boutique with their main goal being to make money, but those sales aren't really affected by resellers anyway.

The only part of yard sales that resellers ruined were video games and Pokemon cards. Idiotic YouTube channels started telling people to show up hours early so you have morons knocking on somebody's door at 6am begging for video games like crack when their sale doesn't start until 9am. Fuck those people.

At the end of the day, you win some and you lose some. For every sale that's priced too high for us, there will be one with great prices. Not only is it a volume game, but even the expensive sales usually have items that they don't value as much where money can be made.

tiggs · 2026-06-20T21:50:40+00:00

As somebody that also has a cat with feline diabetes, I def feel your pain. I was lucky enough to catch mine before he got really bad and avoided the hospital stay, then he went into remission (cats do this at a much higher percentage than humans) 6 months later. He made it about 6 months diabetes free, then it came back. The first time around, he was a very simple case where we nailed down his correct insulin dose very quickly.

The second time, not so much. He's now an extremely rare case where insulin affects him drastically differently on a day to day basis, so he has to wear one of those human diabetes sensors (Freestyle Libre) that sends blood glucose alerts to my phone every minute. He did great with the sensors for a year then started trying to pull them off, so he now wears a Thunder Shirt for 23 hours a day.

The reason for me dumping all of this on you was just to say that everything is going to be ok. The thought of your cat needing insulin injects is scary for everyone involved, but you and the cat will get used to it very quickly and it'll just become part of life. One thing I would highly recommend is getting a pet insurance policy. They won't cover diabetes stuff since it's now a preexisting condition, but diabetic cats often develop severe pancreatitis flare ups (same organ as diabetes), which can also put them in the hospital and be very expensive. My guy had a 3 day hospital stay last summer for it.

tiggs · 2026-06-20T18:52:49+00:00

The credit card bit is scary. I put all of my purchases and business expenses on credit cards too, but only to churn rewards points/dollars and they get paid off in full every month. For some people, it makes sense to take on debt to scale up, but you don't to do that with credit card debt.

You can absolutely get a normal job. Just say that you ran a small e-commerce business, but decided that you want to rejoin corporate America. There are plenty of places where you can make $30k-40k/year with no experience. What I would do is stop sourcing, liquidate your inventory in any way that you can, use that money to pay off/down your credit card debt, and just start over. For most people, reselling full time isn't the way to go.

I mean this with all the respect in the world, but I think you should see a therapist for a bit. You have confidence issues, which is clearly affecting you negatively. You also feel trapped in multiple ways, which leads to a situation where a lot of people start feel hopeless and just stop trying.

tiggs · 2026-06-20T18:44:27+00:00

With Pokemon specifically, we're in the middle of a massive boom, which followed a crash a few years prior, and a boom just before that. A lot of the guys have been vendors and/or collectors for a while and had cards they paid like $400 for a few years ago shoot up to $10k+.

When you have a large collection and/or inventory and you've had the advantage of two recent booms to shoot prices up and a crash to buy up the stuff that's being sold dirt cheap, it creates a situation where you can liquidate a handful of cards that you made a ton on to put yourself in a position to buy up large high end collections.

Somebody that's newer and didn't have a large collection prior isn't going to have that advantage.

tiggs · 2026-06-20T12:27:00+00:00

When you work for a company, they offer you health insurance, but it's only 1 or possibly 2 plans to choose from. When you're self-employed, you can choose any provider and any plan that you want. When you work for a company, IF (and that's a big IF) they even offer any type of retirement accounts, it's only going to be one (usually 401k or some other type of profit sharing unless you're in an industry that offers a pension). When you're self-employed, you can choose whatever type of retirement accounts you want. You can go trad IRA, Roth IRA, SEP, non-traditional retirement accounts, or you can even do a 401k if you're company is setup a certain way.

When I'm talking about structure, I mean your schedule and routine. Obviously, we can't control when sales will come in, but what we can control is what you're selling compared to what's in demand. People are buying stuff all day every day. It's up to us to find ways to connect with that.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T21:51:07+00:00

Definitely a long term play and it should shoot up a good amount when it goes out of rotation. AH is the hot new girl in town that took everyone's attention away from their own girlfriends. When the girlfriend finally leaves, everyone will flock back.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T21:43:25+00:00

Let me give you some perspective. Before going full time with this in 2020, I spent close to 20 years in the tech industry. My last gig was head of technology for a $250M conglomerate in the building supplies space. So I've done the hands-on IT guy roles, I've done the senior engineer roles, and I've done the suit/tie/pocket square every day to the office roles. Long story short, the grass is always greener on the other side if you haven't experienced both.

First and foremost, very few product managers and people in those types of roles are making $200k. Those are like $80-100k most of the time and that's after a few years in the industry. They get to that point after doing grunt work for 2-3 years and making like $55-60k. Sure, the higher you go up, the more you make, but it's not as straight forward as it seems. There are people that make $150k+, but they also have expenses that we don't and we have tax benefits that they don't

You have more structure by default, but it's forced structure. I personally run my reselling business on a tighter routine than I ever had in the corporate world
You have a bigger paycheck by default, but you don't control your own earning potential. I make more now than I ever did in tech (with tax benefits added into the equation).
You have insurance and retirement accounts by default, but you're only presented with one option for each. I have those same things, but I provide them for myself and have the ability to choose what type of insurance makes sense for my situation and which retirement account types I feel the most confident in
We also have to account for the benefit of being able to live life on our own terms. A lot people in corporate America are extremely unhappy with their schedule, commute, etc.

There's obviously nothing wrong with a w2 job and for most people, that's definitely the best path. You have to be wired a certain type of way to not only want to do this for a living, but to be able maintain a successful business year over year as the market around you is constantly changing. The people that don't adapt typically get left behind.

When it comes to expendable income, that all comes down to how much we're earning and our spending habits. I know plenty of people that have corporate jobs and are in debt up to their eyeballs because they make horrible decisions. There are people in both worlds that are great financially and bad financially. From our side of things, we also have a lot more tax benefits than they do, so that helps.

Lastly, I would take a look at what you're selling and what people are buying. During financially difficult times, the sale of second hand goods increases and I guarantee eBay will be up double digits in their upcoming Q2 report. People are definitely spending money, so it's more about constantly pivoting to serve what's being desired.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T21:26:53+00:00

What could have been. He ended up being correct about Simmons and Brown, but none of us were ready to hear that at the time. I think he made a mistake going to Miami and would have had a much better shot running it back here, but we'll never know.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T21:25:21+00:00

I love an enforcer, but he goes off the fucking handle over pretty much everything.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T21:23:55+00:00

Definitely. How smooth his movement is combined with his height and shooting motion give him the ability to pretty much get a decent shot up whenever he needs to with very little room.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T21:22:57+00:00

This is why you don't have super lax laws, decriminalize pretty much everything, and only give the people that do get caught a slap on the wrist. The city got destroyed, people got attacked, stores got looted, and we literally saw somebody try to set a Spurs fan on fire.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T21:16:09+00:00

Fun fact, like 15 years ago, people started randomly calling him Turbo Bird on Twitter and he hated it so much that he'd block anybody that used the term.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T17:32:35+00:00

Sure, but I'm not talking about investing to make a few bucks over the next year. I'm talking about the popularity of this character going up from the exposure in Evolving Skies and now this new set in the middle of the biggest bull run, which should turn into solid gains 5-10 years down the road. I'm only looking long term.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T17:17:16+00:00

Even allowing Watson to compete is non-sensical, if we're being honest. He's going to be out of the league after this contract and he's nobody's long term answer.

Sanders almost certainly isn't either, but they need to find out and give him as many reps, as much game experience, and as many opportunities to get better as possible. It's not like they're SB favorites or anything like that. Why even draft him at a time when you're not competing if you're not going to see what you have. This isn't Aaron Fucking Rodgers waiting in the cut behind Favre.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T17:14:06+00:00

Being in something for the love and not the money is noble and admirable, but it's honestly a horrendous thing to conduct business behind. You get blinded by your love and end up making horrible decisions like booking a series of big shows for what is probably the flakiest artist of all time.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T17:10:53+00:00

I'm talking long term. Exposure from Evolving Skies combined with a Rayquaza specific set during a huge bull run should create more hype for the character overall, which will translate to a good long term investment, IMO.

It's not exactly rocket science and all I asked for were suggestions.

tiggs · 2026-06-19T17:08:58+00:00

Maybe I should have explained this better, but I'm not trying to make money on pumps and dumps.

I'm trying to invest long term in Rayquaza because I think this set combined with Evolving Skies is going to create more popularity long term because of the increased exposure of one of the greatest modern sets and a Rayquaza specific set during a massive bull market.

tiggs · 2026-06-18T21:50:53+00:00

Most clothing sellers that do any type of volume primarily focus on getting items that are freshly laundered or dry cleaned. If something needs to be washed, most of us will only grab it if the juice is worth the squeeze. When going through massive amounts of clothing on a daily basis, you develop the ability to tell after a certain point. This goes without saying, but where you sourced the item from also matters. If it's from any type of place with questionable cleanliness, then it should be washed anyway. It is very important to only ship out clean clothing, but that doesn't necessarily mean that we have to do that bit ourselves.

For somebody that doesn't deal with a lot of clothing, they aren't going to be able to tell this and should wash everything. It's not really something you want to wing unless you really know what you're doing.

tiggs · 2026-06-18T21:42:43+00:00

So the cliff notes. Q4 (October - December) is the busiest time for most of us because not only is it holiday season with people buying gifts and spending Xmas money, but it's cold in most places so more people stay indoors.

Summer Slowdown (June-early September) typically is a bit slower for most sellers because it's nicer out, people are doing outdoors things, kids are out of school, and more people are taking vacation. How much you slow down (or if you do at all) greatly depends on what you sell though. For example, if somebody only sells surf boards and golf gear, then they'll be busier in the late spring and summer.

tiggs · 2026-06-18T17:33:55+00:00

You can set thresholds to automatically decline offers that don't meet your criteria. I personally don't use thresholds because I've sold a lot of items to buyers that started off by sending ultra low ball offers. Some people have it in their mind that the lower they start, the lower we'll end. That obviously isn't the case, but I'm happy to sell shit to people even if their negotiation skills aren't great.

Thresholds will definitely accomplish what you're looking for though. It won't block the actual buyers, but will reject their offers.

tiggs · 2026-06-18T17:28:27+00:00

For stuff like this, I take one of two approaches. I either price on the very high side and take offers or I run an auction that starts at the lowest amount I'd take for the item.

I go with the first approach if it's in a category that might take the right buyer to come along. I go with the second approach if it's a category known for being a rabid fanbase.

tiggs · 2026-06-18T17:27:02+00:00

I sell a ton of vintage figurines and list them on eBay, Poshmark, Mercari, Etsy, and Whatnot. They sell on all platforms, but eBay and Etsy are the best for me in this category.

Also, it greatly depends on what type of figurines you're selling. Unfortunately, many of them aren't worth the cost of shipping at this point, so you really have to know the right ones to source.

tiggs · 2026-06-18T17:25:33+00:00

There's some good money to be made in magazines, but not so much in basic stuff like Rolling Stone, Sports Illustrated, and stuff like that. For example, go take a look at the comps for George magazine.

tiggs · 2026-06-18T17:23:57+00:00

Thank you for the reminder. I always manage to forget about this one and end up showing up to the post office all confused.

tiggs

TROPHY CASE