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Selling for other people / teaming up

cornsnakeforsale_com

cornsnakeforsale_com

Just Another Corn Breeder
I was wondering who has experience partnering up with other breeders to sell your snakes. I know some people who also breed snakes and I want to offer to let them sell through me for some kind of fee. I'm trying to come up with the terms. Of course different people will respond to different offers, I'm just trying to come up with a baseline.

Here's what I've come up with so far:

You can list your animals with me for a fee, say 20%? You sell a $100 snake I process the order and pass it to you. I get a $20 commission, you get an $80 sale.

You can't underprice your animals as this will eat into my own sales unfairly.

When a sale is made, I hand it off to you. You handle all aspects of it at that point.

I'd only deal with trusted people, so I wouldn't worry too much about things going sour. I would still require some kind of contract and basic protection for both parties. Or is it better to just try to get them to sell me their stock? Seems like it would be better to keep the risk on them and keep the transactions clean. No "listing fees", etc. Just when there's a sale I get a piece for getting eyes on your items and getting them off your shelf.

What other types of things should I be considering?
 
cornsnakeforsale_com said:
What other types of things should I be considering?
Click to expand...

Is this for shows or via the internet?

Via the internet, remember that the terms of selling here at CS.com are for your animals only. You would be violating Rich's rules by selling someone else's snakes. Especially considering you would be making money off of them while Rich would only get your $25 and not their's.

For shows, sounds fair enough, though you would not be handing anything off. Of course, what is gained by them if they still have to handle the transaction once you find them a customer . . . ??

D80
 
Uh... OK. So can I pay a second registration fee?

This would be online only, doesn't make too much sense for a show unless they're not showing up.

So where does one get a copy of these rules anyway?
 
I kind of think the rules Rich made are pretty cut and dried. If you didn't produce them, you can't sell them here. I think the exception would be selling stock which you purchased, but no longer fits into your breeding plans. That's kind of taking a black and white and trying to turn it grey in my opinion.
 
Can someone refer me to these rules please. Not to be rude, but... you all are being kinda rude. I'm not sure what black and white has to do with anything when I can't even find these rules I'm not breaking.
 
Rules are scattered all over the forum. Most are in the form of "stickies" located at the top of subforums, others are just rulings that Rich has made along the way as they were needed, and others are discussed away from the general membership. Here is a quote from the owner of this site on this particular subject that is located in the Moderator's forum.

Rich Z said:
If someone is selling animals for someone who is not a contributing member, no, that is not acceptable here.

Of course, unless someone actually admits to that, it would be very hard to determine otherwise.
Click to expand...

When in doubt, ask a moderator or Rich himself.
 
Thanks for your answer. Kinda makes things difficult especially since I wasn't in doubt. So, that isn't really what my post is about, anyone have any thoughts on the actual question?

And is there someone who can OK stuff or just a bunch of random rules scattered around? I didn't think Rich was doing this stuff any more and I wouldn't really want to bug him anyway.
 
Rich is on here every day. Like right now.
CSFS_com, I would humbly and in a friendly way suggest that this would be a subject you might take up with him in private. Not on the open forum. Approach can mean everything, and sometimes it can put people off.
Just a friendly suggestion.
I have pondered on such things myself. Like letting someone sell snakes for me, so I'm not being an arse.
Eric
 
Thanks. Wasn't a subject I brought up at all. Guess I'll have to ask him about it if I ever even do it here.

Anyone have some input on my question? Trying to figure out next year's master plan.
 
Honestly, there really aren't a whole lot of formal rules here, as I expect people to act reasonably and maturely about matters. Truth be known, I don't think I have ever made many explicit rules concerning posting classified ads here except that the poster must be a Contributor member. If anything specific comes up, myself or the mods will approach the member directly to clarify what we feel is conducive to things running smoothly here. Which, fortunately, is rather rare.

If I understand you correctly, I will state that you are setting yourself up for quite a lot of headaches. YOU will be responsible for the quality, health, accuracy, etc. of those animals that someone else is selling under your name. Since their reputation is not at risk, their concern about such things may be a bit lacking, since you will be the one left holding the bag because of any shortcomings in their animals. Not to mention that many people really do like to know the actual source of their animals, whenever possible. You may hear people calling someone a "flipper" here and there, which basically means someone who just buys animals from someone else to "flip" to another buyer for a profit. In case you don't know, this isn't normally a complimentary label.

So am I specifically saying that you can't do that here? Well, there really isn't any formal rule here against is, but I predict you will have quite a bit of resistance if you expect a large customer base from this site. And quite honestly, if you intend to set up a site that is specifically targeted to compete with the modest sales taking place here, well you just might get some resistance from me if it appears you are intending to USE this site as a stepping stone to your own ambitions. While I do accept banner advertising via my FaunaAds site, generally posts or threads that are obviously "COME TO MY SITE!" sort of advertising is not welcomed.

In any event, based on your initial description, why do you think you will be able to sell animals better or more easily than anyone else in order to earn that commission you desire? If the seller is going to have to do the shipping, be responsible for all aspects of the sale, and any support afterwards, well where will you come in? They can certainly set up their own site to sell animals, or pay $25 and advertise here themselves. Actually they can also advertise on my FaunaClassifieds site for FREE. So unless you already have an established avenue for them to advertise their animals through you, what's the incentive for them to do that?

If you are going to BUY the animals from them for resale, how long do you think you will keep them, with the subsequent overhead to care for and feed them until they are sold? Over the years, MANY people have tried to be brokers in the manner you are suggesting and very few are still in business now. Once you start looking into caging, storing shipping materials, maintaining a rodent colony, quarantine procedures, shipping headaches, the inevitable mortality losses, and the workload involved no matter which way you consider doing this, you may become a bit discouraged at the realistic chances you have of being successful at it. Quite honestly, unless you have a rather sizable bankroll in your wallet to launch this venture that will tide you over for the first five years to get established, and you think this is a nice easy way to make quick money, you may want to get some realistic advice about what you plan to do.

Personally, I think there is a whole lot more to this than you realize in order to do what you are thinking about doing.
 
Thanks for your response. I'm quite reasonable and mature. A direct approach from a mod would have been a much nicer route, I agree. I suppose someone can call me a flipper if they want, but they wouldn't know what they were talking about. Why can someone sell better than someone else? That's just the way it is. Where will I come in? I made them a sale that they could not get themselves. It's a "finder's fee", "commission", "advertising fee" or whatever else you want to call it. There's nothing abnormal there. It's not much different than selling something on Amazon or Ebay. You list your stuff on my site and if you make a sale you pay me something for making it possible. My "enterprise" is much tinier than most peoples' here, so I'm not sure how anyone could have any resistance to anything I'm talking about.
 
As far as internet sales, most people here either have websites or paid forums (I have both), and Rich has generously allowed a banner to my site in my signature. I hope that people visit my site, but I sure as you-know-what am not about to waste Rich's band width or break his rules by shouting it out.

As far as shows go,...that is another matter to me. I can't attend shows at all due to my work schedule. I would partner up with someone who does shows if it was someone I trusted and we came to an agreement. The animals of course would be sold as my own and there would be an arrangement about compensation beforehand....the person would in effect be representing me at a show, as well as selling his or her own animals.
If in time something like that should come up, that could benefit both parties, I would agree to a partnership. But as far as internet sales, based on what I see here, most members here are quite all set in that regard....
 
I think that everyone who would care about the idea of your "enterprise" already have themselves setup with a site and using forums to sell there animal... so personally I wouldn't see a point in your idea.
Now 2 breeders teaming up with breeding, sales etc... that's a better idea.
 
The question is, why do you think that you are going to do better at selling their snakes than they could? You are an unknown, and selling animals that aren't even yours is going to make people really wary of doing business with you. And there's here, there's fauna, there's kingsnake, there's pre-loved, there's craigslist, etc. How do you plan to compete with these big name and easy to use locations?
How are you going to handle disputes between buyer and seller, as by offering to sell these animals you are basically promoting the selling as being someone trustworthy to buy from?
I also think you'll have a hard time finding someone willing to accept a 20% commission fee. Maybe 10%, but even that I'm not sure about.
 
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