How many years have people been saying, “I’ll just put it on eBay and sell it”?

For a long time, it sounded simple. It became so popular there were even real brick-and-mortar stores that would take your item, list it, sell it, and hand you the money after their cut. That’s how easy it seemed.

I was one of the people who believed it was a simple transaction.

Boy, did I learn the truth.

I had a prototype action figure of myself in a hazmat suit, triumphantly holding up a Baby Ruth candy bar in a recently drained swimming pool—an homage to Carl Spackler (Bill Murray) in Caddyshack. I had already used my resources photographing it for a previous post here on the site.

Then the marketing professionals at Chainsaw Chicken International, Ltd. decided they were going with a different commemorative statue for our 25th anniversary celebration.

So I said the four famous words:

“Sell it on eBay.”

It sat there for a week and sold.

I boxed it up and shipped it before I even received the funds.
“Just get rid of it. I’m on to my next project,” I said.

Eventually the deposit arrived, and I forgot all about it.

Then came the email.

The customer claimed:

“The item is different than the description.”

“What????” I asked.

eBay explained I now had several exciting options:

  1. Accept the return, pay for return shipping, and issue a full refund.
  2. Let him keep the item and still issue a full refund.
  3. Offer a partial refund and hope everyone discovers inner peace.

Keep in mind, I had already paid the original shipping.

Now I was expected to pay return shipping too.

And, naturally, eBay still enjoyed their handling fees.

I didn’t want to hear another word about it.

I called accounting and said:

“Refund it. Let him keep it. I’m done.”

So we did.

The following week, I saw the same statue listed on eBay for twice what he paid.

And it sold.