Is eBay Going To Launch Fee Free Selling In The US?
UPDATE 10-30-24
We finally have an official statement on the prospect of eBay bringing fee-free selling to the US, with CEO Jamie Iannone giving a very direct "no" when asked about it on the Q3 2024 earnings call.
Liz Morton
To your questions on the US, we have no plans to launch free selling in the US. The US is a different market from the UK. UK buyers and sellers are more open to buyer fees, it's more standard in the market.
There may be certain aspects of the product experience to streamline selling that we bring to other markets and as you know we look at each market and categories and think about the specifics of what's the optimal set of initiatives to unlock more supply and demand for that specific market.
UPDATE 9-30-24
The mystery has been solved with UK media letting the cat out of the bag early - fee-free private selling in the UK will be expanding to all categories except Motors.
Liz Morton
UPDATE 9-26-24
Day 1 of eBay Open is in the books but no exciting new fee announcements were made.
Liz Morton
UK sellers who say the message attempted to get more information in their weekly community chat - but all eBay staff would say is....they had nothing to say.
community-teamebay
Hello. Can you tell us anything about the "It's free to sell" (with no details) pop ups that many people have received in past 24 hours?
Dave@eBay responded:
At the moment, I don't have additional information on this. As soon as there are any updates, we will get them posted.
Then Kat@eBay also responded:
Currently, we do not have additional information on this . Rest assured, should there be any updates,we will inform all of our users.
Whether that's because they truly don't know the answer or the information is being held back for a Fall Update presumably "coming soon" is still anyone's guess at this point.
That being said, if it had simply been a technical error, it would seem easy enough to confirm that, apologize for the confusion, and move on.
No matter how this eventually turns out, it's an excellent example of how eBay's lack of direct, transparent communication erodes seller trust and confidence in the platform - something that hopefully new Chief Communications Officer Gigi Ganatra Duff will remedy.
Liz Morton
UPDATE:
Sellers in the UK are also reporting seeing this popup in their Seller Hub, adding to the confusion about what exactly it could mean.
rare_treat
eBay often releases a Fall Seller Update around the same time as eBay Open, and those updates typically impact all the various eBay sites (with some slight difference in some countries), so it's entirely possible there could be something bigger brewing.
It's also possible eBay could have shown it to US users in error or those reporting it to Justin Resells could be UK based even though he himself is in the US - in which case it could simply be an expansion of fee free selling for private sellers in the UK to all categories (excluding Motors) instead of the current limitation to clothing sellers only.
That would make a lot more sense than fee free selling in the US - though US sellers will likely be disappointed if that is the case.
And it would also explain why eBay put a hold on the regular 70-80% off Final Value Fees promo sellers in the UK usually receive fortnightly.
Liz Morton
Rumors are swirling that eBay could be set to make a big announcement at their annual seller conference tomorrow, with some sellers reporting seeing a very odd message in Seller Hub today indicating fee-free selling could be coming to the US very soon!
What’s up with this, #ebay? @ValueAddedRS pic.twitter.com/zGzR9L0g3I
— Pat(ricia) (@materialculture) September 24, 2024
Youtuber JustinResells says he's been fielding reports from sellers who say this message popped up in Seller Hub today, but when they clicked the link it apparently just went back to Seller Hub with no additional information provided.
eBay has made similar moves in Germany across all categories and in the UK for clothing - with the important distinction in both countries that it only applies to private (non-business) sellers.
Liz Morton
This apparent premature launch in Seller Hub for US sellers is missing some context, but if it is real - there will likely be limiting factors as well including possibly being restricted to personal rather than business accounts, only certain categories (the screenshot shows an exclusion for Motors), a certain order or dollar volume or some combination of criteria.
Several eBay competitors have also recently ditched selling fees - but unlike eBay's efforts in the UK and Germany, those competitors have shifted most or all of the fee burden to buyers instead.
Etsy-owned Depop initially shifted fees in the UK before expanding the new fee structure to the US in July.
Liz Morton
And Mercari similarly shook up their fee structure in March - though so far results have been mixed with US CEO John Lagerling having to admit the new fee structure had not resulted in the GMV performance they had hoped when internally announcing a layoff of ~45% of US staff in June.
Liz Morton
I don't believe eBay is in a position to simply eat the fee loss across most sales on their main US marketplace, and I don't believe eBay buyers would react positively to the introduction of a buyer fee, as evidenced by the mixed results from Mercari.
That leads me to say the most likely scenario is that if eBay does introduce fee free selling to the US, it will still be in a limited capacity rather than sitewide with the exception of Motors - but of course anything could happen!
I've reached out to eBay for comment but have not received a response as of time of publishing.
Stay tuned for updates from eBay Open September 25-26 and if you saw this strange announcement in your Seller Hub today, let us know in the comments below!
