Jewelry & Graduation: Preparing Your Reselling Business For Summer! - Episode #111

[00:00:00] Welcome to the Jewelry Resellers Podcast, your go-to source for all things shiny, sparkly, and of course, profitable. I'm your host, Desiree, and I'll be your guide on this dazzling journey through the world of reselling jewelry. We'll be diving deep into the art and science of reselling, uncovering valuable tips, insider secrets, and sharing stories from successful jewelry resellers. We'll explore market trends, industry news, and even discuss the jewelry resellers.

[00:00:30] How to Find Those Hidden Gems Just Waiting to be Discovered in Thrift Stores, Estate Sales, and Beyond. So, if you're dreaming of turning your hobby into a hustle, or if you're a seasoned pro looking to stay at the top of your jewelry reselling game, join me each week for insights, stories, and more on the Jewelry Resellers Podcast. Okay, so Brandon is becoming a regular on the podcast.

[00:01:01] I guess you can say that. I guess you can say that. Yeah, yeah. So, for those of you that may not know, Brandon has been on the podcast two times. This is going to be his third appearance on the show. And he's got some exciting news to share. So, Brandon, why don't you start us off by, of course, introducing yourself in case someone has not seen the other two episodes that you were on, and then sharing with us your wonderful news. Yes, definitely.

[00:01:30] Well, my name's Brandon. I own Heartland Picker LLC. I've been buying and selling antiques and collectibles since I was about nine years old. Really, my focus is in jewelry. Anything from vintage to antique jewelry, gold, silver, costume, all that stuff. I have a few antique booths. I do like whatnot and have my own website, HeartlandPicker.com.

[00:01:53] And that's a little bit of history about me. And you can go to my YouTube channel and see a ton of videos going back probably like five or six years ago that I've done a bunch of live sales on YouTube. But my big news is that the date that we're recording this a week from Saturday, it will be my graduation from college. So I'm super happy about it. It's good to just be over with it. I bet.

[00:02:25] Yeah, so Brandon sent me a message, I think last week saying that he is graduating soon. And I wanted to bring him on the podcast because number one, I want to celebrate that because I know how huge and how much work it takes and how much time and how much of your life you have to dedicate to, you know, going to school, getting your degree and doing it.

[00:02:50] Doing all the things that go along with that. So I want to celebrate that and tell you congratulations. And I also, I also want to talk about, you know, what is coming next for you, because now you're going to have so much more time and so much more flexibility with your schedule that I think that your jewelry business is definitely going to, like, grow, explode.

[00:03:17] I mean, tell us, tell us what, you know, what life is going to look like for, you know, for you after you graduate. Yeah, so after I graduate in about a week or so, I'm going on a little vacation and taking a trip to a big antique show, one that I go to every year. And then after that, I'm going to start doing my whatnot shows regularly.

[00:03:39] My plan is to do about two a week to start out and then maybe I'll gradually do more shows or more pop-ups throughout the week. I do have a whatnot show coming up that I have the thumbnail out for it and it's to honor, you know, my graduating from college and just kind of like a customer appreciation sort of sale. Because I did hit 3,000 followers on whatnot, which I'm super excited about. Congratulations for that too. Thank you.

[00:04:08] It happened a couple weeks ago. So I'm doing, like, a bunch of vintage jewelry, like Haskell, Weiss, Trafari, Monet. I might have some Dior. I'm not sure yet. But I'm going to do $5 starts. I know it might sound ridiculous to start that off at $5, but I'm sure my customers will love the cheap starts.

[00:04:29] But as for things other than whatnot, I do have a lot planned for the summer, specifically with in-person shows. I do plan to go and sell at a lot of in-person events in the Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska area. So if you're ever in one of those areas, you might find me at one of your vintage shows. Oh, that's great. That's great. Well, see, now you bring up another point too as we move into summer.

[00:04:59] Because so many people say business slows down for them in summer. You know, I'm sure you've heard the old summer slowdown and people say, oh, you know, I don't make as much money in the summertime. And I know to some degree that that is true. But I've also had a couple of summers as a jewelry reseller where I've done really, really well. And so I want to get your take on it. What do you think about, you know, summer slowdown as a jewelry reseller? Like, have you experienced that?

[00:05:27] Or like, what's your take? There are a couple websites online that I've had slowdowns in the summer. But I don't really have any slowdowns considering how much I do for my business. With the antique shops, people are finally, you know, getting out of school like me now. And they are going to want to travel. So they go to all the different antique shops and little towns that they can go to visit.

[00:05:54] So I get a lot of tourism people that come in and buy stuff. So it's not really a slowdown there. And to also prevent a summer slowdown, I do a lot of in-person shows. So that is antique festivals, vintage markets. I do a couple of vintage clothing markets because I dabble in the vintage clothing section a little bit. But the clothing markets that I do, there's no just jewelry vendors at all.

[00:06:19] And so I like to be the accessory vendor and bring in a whole bunch of, you know, jewelry, accessories, compacts, purses, things like that. So that way people have an option to style their outfit with. Hmm. That's a good idea. And, you know, you said something, too, that just reminded me of, you know, a lot of us as jewelry resellers, we don't only sell jewelry. We sell clothing, shoes. In my case, I used to do handbags.

[00:06:48] So maybe that's part of the approach. So you don't have a summer slowdown is you keep selling your jewelry, but maybe you incorporate other categories or other niches as well. So that way you're not only relying on one particular subset of customers. Right. So. Yeah.

[00:07:11] And the thing is about jewelry, it seems like even when people aren't shopping for jewelry, if they see it, they tend to, like, get interested and they want to look. That's what I've noticed when I've done in person, like jewelry shows or like antique malls and stuff. If they walk by, they're like, oh, wow, what do you got? You know, they may not have even been looking to buy jewelry, but they see it and suddenly it's a draw.

[00:07:36] Yeah. Well, exactly. On that point, I just did a vintage clothing market a couple of weeks ago and I have one lady come into the booth and she looks at the table and she starts picking up stuff. And I hand her a basket because, you know, I have these little red baskets that people can hold and put their jewelry in to shop around with. So they don't have like a heaping mound of necklaces or something on their hands. Right. And like have both hands to look around.

[00:08:01] And the lady, I have a couple like signs out saying, you know, oh, all the jewelry is $5 each or two for eight. But the lady apparently didn't see the signs. And so she turns to me and she goes, well, how much is all this? I said, oh, well, it's all $5 each or two for eight. The way her face just dropped was like, I love this. And I'm like, yep, all four tables. And she's like, wow. And she probably bought around 100 pieces or so. Oh, that's great. Yeah.

[00:08:31] But it was just the look on her face when she was like, wait, it's all $5 each or two for eight? I'm like, yep. Yeah. And I think, too, that's, you know, that's the other approach is you kind of have to have different price points, right? Like you have your lower price point stuff and that, you know, people get excited, like you said, with that lady. But sometimes that's also the thing that draws people in. And they'll say, oh, well, what else do you have?

[00:08:58] And then they'll be interested in looking at your higher price pieces. You know, if they find a bunch of other stuff that they love, you know, once you kind of get them in and they're willing to spend $5, if you have something more that, you know, may command a higher price, they're a lot more open to it. Right? Because they know, like, oh, well, if he's got this great stuff for $5, what does he have that's $10 or $20 or $50 or whatever? Yeah, exactly.

[00:09:28] All right. So now the other thing about summer, too, is I know a couple of resellers will be traveling and they plan to, like you said, visit antique malls, what else, like yard sales, flea markets, thrift store, whatever. So have you done anything like that where you've traveled to go sourcing for your jewelry? Oh, yes, I definitely have.

[00:09:58] A lot of the times it's within the state here in Iowa and I'll travel from like one end to the other or, you know, something like that. Here in August, we have a sale called the Highway 141 sales and it goes from basically, basically goes from Des Moines all the way to the west west border, basically with Iowa, Nebraska. I get about maybe 80 miles.

[00:10:23] I usually do about roughly 60 to 80 miles and then I get tired and I go home. But I do that trip. And then I also go to Gold Rush up in Rochester, Minnesota. That's a fun one. And that's the one I'm going to be going to in a few weeks here. So that one I usually find a bunch of good jewelry and I know probably about 20 or 30 vendors at that show personally. So they give me good deals when I go up there. Yeah.

[00:10:53] So you're giving me some ideas because that's one of the things I want to do. I want to travel this summer and I'm really close to California, but I haven't heard that California is like really the best place to source jewelry because it's pretty pricey. You know, like when you go to New York or something. Yeah. But I also heard Arizona was good and Arizona is not that far.

[00:11:17] So I might I might venture out and explore this summer because that sounds like fun to just take a road trip and just look for jewelry. Yeah. I haven't had the time to road trips. This is like my time to road trip because I've been stuck in college for four years or school for 12 technically. So I've since I've had all the classes and stuff and I had to work on my education, it's just like, well, I haven't had time to go take a road trip somewhere. Mm hmm.

[00:11:47] But now I get to. Now, the other thing you said that really kind of piqued my interest is you said that you are selling in multiple ways. Right. So you have whatnot shows. You've got your website. You've got your antique mall booths. Yeah. You've also got your little pop ups whenever they happen, you know, what, you know, here, there, wherever.

[00:12:17] So I think that's another thing that jewelry resellers or maybe just resellers in general need to consider is being in multiple places and multiple formats, you know, as much as you can. And obviously, not everybody's going to have the same, you know, availability to do that.

[00:12:38] But I think that's that's part of what will help you offset any type of slow summer sales or whatever the case may be is just being in as many places as you can. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And it's definitely helpful, especially here in the Midwest when in the winter time, the shops tend to do pretty bad. You know, the antique shops.

[00:13:02] I'm not trying to diss on them, but people are just not going out when there's six to 12 inches of snow on the ground. Right. When when it because Iowa weather is just it's so bipolar. It could go from one thing to the next within a week. So when people see the winter driving and, you know, it's pretty bad out here, they're not going to want to go out. And so the shops slow down. Well, I need a different way to sell stuff to make money that day.

[00:13:28] So either, you know, yeah, I hop on whatnot or I do some listings on my website or I'll sell or I'll text some friends, you know, what I have and maybe do some virtual sales through that as well. So, yeah. And you've also done some sales. What on on social media? Right. Like YouTube, Instagram. Yeah. I don't know if you've done. Have you done any sales on TikTok yet or no? I on TikTok.

[00:13:55] I use TikTok live to open mystery jewelry boxes and just have fun with it. Yeah. So it's a lot of fun. Yeah, I know. I love TikTok. It's so funny because I have like multiple accounts on TikTok and then I have like some client accounts that I manage on TikTok. So I spend way more time on TikTok than I probably should. But there's such huge potential there.

[00:14:24] So if you are listening or watching this podcast episode, I do want to encourage you to at least have some kind of a presence on TikTok because it's it's growing. And so many people are are tuning into TikTok for news, information, education and now shopping. Right. Yeah.

[00:14:48] And not only that, but I with the going on the shopping, I made, you know, a few TikTok videos about my website. And one lady I now became friends with and she's bought probably 15 or so jewelry mystery bags from me because she loves my product. And she's like, well, now you're one of my suppliers. And I'm like, all right, let's go. Yeah, that's great. That's great.

[00:15:15] I know I need to I probably need to buy some of your your mystery bags. I have so much jewelry. It's funny. I need to make my own. Yeah. Jewelry jars. But you know how you get bored with your own stuff and so you want to see what somebody else has. So that's kind of it. Sometimes I get bored with my stuff. Sometimes not because I have a collection of over 1200 enamel flowers and I never get bored of just staring at all. Right, right.

[00:15:42] But it's it's also kind of fun when I buy in bulk because I have a whole room full of jewelry. And every time I like open a drawer or open a box, I'm like, when did I buy this? Like, wait, when was this? I don't remember this piece. Yeah. Well, you're gonna have to give us an update on your enamel flower collection because I remember last time when you showed it, everybody was oohing and aahing.

[00:16:10] And they were like, well, how many does he have? I said probably thousands by now. Yeah. It's probably over 12 or 1500 at least. That is so cool. I'm still buying ones that I know I don't have. If I see a unique or abstract one and I'm like, that's not a duplicate, then I'll buy it. Yeah, that is so cool. That is so cool. I think I have maybe 10 of them, you know, but I sell mine, you know, when I get them, I sell them.

[00:16:39] So I don't collect them because I said I've just got too much stuff and I'd rather have the money. All right. So let's talk about WhatNot because I think I talked about this a few podcast episodes back where I went to the Boss Reseller Remix and it got me re-excited, you know, and re-motivated to hop back onto WhatNot.

[00:17:06] So how has WhatNot been going for you or are you taking a break or like what's going on with WhatNot? Well, I've slowly started buying again on WhatNot. And the reason is I'm trying to build my presence on WhatNot again because I've been pretty much gone for six, seven months, you know, with my senior year. I think the last show I did was Spring Break, which was a few months ago, but not too many people came to that.

[00:17:37] But I think it's, yeah, WhatNot, in order to get the sales you want, you need to build a presence. And one of the ways I do it is just by supporting other sellers and buying their products. There's about 15 or 20 people I regularly watch because I know they have good deals and I know when I go into their show, they know me and they gain me a lot of followers.

[00:18:00] There's one seller who literally said, I will do a gift card giveaway if we can get the Heartland Picker to 2,500 followers. And I gained probably 40 to 60 followers that night. And then that person ran a gift card giveaway and somebody won it. So it's things like that. If you're just kind to the sellers and buy their product and get friendly with them, they'll definitely help you out.

[00:18:28] As for doing WhatNot shows, I hope to get back into it here in the next few weeks and start to sell a whole lot more on there. One of the cool things that one of the cool privileges I have on WhatNot is I was enrolled to a beta program where I can do my own customer service. So I'm not going through I'm not going through WhatNot anymore and waiting for them to do the customer service for me.

[00:18:55] I get to decide which orders I want to refund if they get a partial refund or if they need to return it. I get to decide if I want to decline a refund request and just a whole bunch of different customer service settings that I get to play with. So that's a beta program. It's not available to everyone or. Well, when I signed up for it, it was only for like people with five star ratings.

[00:19:23] And there's like a certain little category of things you had to be. So I think it's open to everyone now, but like only if you have these certain achievements through WhatNot. OK. OK. Yeah. Yeah. Because that that's one of the complaints people have about WhatNot is the customer service.

[00:19:43] Is you have to wait sometimes a day or two to get an email back from WhatNot about a return or an error or whatever the case was. And I'm glad they're doing that because, you know, the customer shouldn't have to wait. Like like let's say I made a mistake or something was damaged. Then, of course, I would, you know, refund or exchange it if I could. You know, I would I would do what I could do.

[00:20:12] I don't think they should have to wait, you know, for resolution on something like that. Yeah. And and with the customer service thing, they said if if you and the buyer do not come to an agreement or, you know, you can't come to an agreement of resolving the issue, then WhatNot will take the case number and they will look through your case and then they will be the ones to decide what happens. OK, so kind of like eBay. Yeah, they'll be like the tiebreaker. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:20:42] All right. Well, that's good. Yeah. Like I said, I've been getting more more interested in trying to hop back into the WhatNot game because I told you I for some reason I just don't do good over there. I do much better on Poshmark Live and District and I love selling over there, but I really wish I would do better on WhatNot. I don't know what I'm doing wrong over there, but it's just not working. But I'm going to try again.

[00:21:12] I'm going to try again. Well, hopefully. What? We hope to see you back. Yeah. Yeah. The thing is, is like what I think is the times that I can be on WhatNot are the times that everybody, all the other jewelry sellers are on WhatNot. And so I just, you know, I get buried with all the regulars who have bigger followings and much more established, you know, accounts or whatever.

[00:21:42] So I have to figure out a way of getting on when there's not as many jewelry sellers on. Yeah. Which would mean super early or super late. Well, see, and I'll give a little secret on how I do my shows. I, with my, this is for my pop-ups because when I do my regular scheduled shows, those are going to be the ones that are the set time. I'm definitely going to be on at that time, no matter who's on.

[00:22:08] But with my pop-ups, I like to go into the bigger shows and wait until they say they're about done. And when they say they're about done, then I will start mine and cross my fingers that they'll rate into me. And that'll bring a whole lot of people into my show and I can continue the whole night long. Yeah, that is a really smart strategy.

[00:22:32] And the thing is, too, if you're active, you know, like you said, in their show, like in the chat or like you bought a few things and they're like, oh, great. Thanks, Heartland Picker or whatever. Then you get on their radar, right? Oh, yeah. Not only the seller, but also the other people in the show. Mm-hmm. And it definitely helps to have good customer service, good product and all that so people can give you five stars.

[00:22:57] Because on the review page, or at least my review page, there's five stars going all the way down as far as you can see. And one of the cool things that Whatnot has done in the past couple months, I think maybe two or three months ago, they just did this, where now sellers can respond to reviews. So if you ever did get a negative review, you can always respond to that person and, you know, say out loud whatever it is you wanted to say.

[00:23:27] Mm-hmm. Right. So just like eBay then, where you can explain what happened or whatever. Yeah, okay. All right. So, well, that's good to know that I think that there's still a chance for a lot of us jewelry resellers on Whatnot. Now, I'm really, really interested in, I know you saw the interview I did with Doug.

[00:23:53] I'm really interested in doing live sales on YouTube. Oh, yeah. And so I'm going to try that this summer as well because, you know, Doug is saying that's the way to go. Oh, yeah. So I'm going to try that and see how that goes because if I can get that working, then I may not need to sell on Whatnot, right? I may not need to and then I won't have to deal with, you know, the Whatnot fees and all that. Yeah.

[00:24:22] Yeah. The, I liked when I moved to Whatnot, I really liked how Whatnot just worked and, you know, it's just a swipe. That's it. When I was on YouTube, I and hopefully my buyers are kind of listening to this and hopefully this isn't going to be targeted to some. But some of the buyers that I had, it took forever to get the payment.

[00:24:49] Like it would be two or three months and I would keep sending them reminders on PayPal being like, hey, you have this order to pay. You have this order to pay. And they were like, oh, well, just let me get my money in about a week. And then they kept giving excuses and excuses. And then eventually they paid. But with Whatnot, you know, the money comes right away. So I don't have to wait two or three months for someone to pay an invoice.

[00:25:17] I could just go right on Whatnot and get the money quickly that way. But again, I'm not basing it on like the whole group totally from my YouTube buyers. You know, I still will do an occasional YouTube sale, but it's been probably four ever since I did one. Yeah, we'll see because I know a lot of the. Jewelry sellers that I watch on YouTube, they say you have to pay within 48 hours.

[00:25:48] And if they don't, then the item is a backup for sale in their next show. Yeah, so the way I look at it is if I'm going to take the time to type up your invoice and get the items prepared for shipping, you better pay the invoice. I'm not going to take it, you know, delete the whole thing that I've worked on invoicing and then relist it for someone else to buy. Yeah, but but but see on a on a YouTube live sale, you don't have to relist it.

[00:26:18] You just delete that invoice, which, yeah, I know you took the time to. Yeah. To type it up and everything. But at least on a YouTube sale, you don't have to relist it. You just show it again in your next show. Yeah, that is true. And I think there's one lady. I can't remember if she still does this because I saw this like about a year ago or over a year ago. When you register for her live sales, she requires.

[00:26:49] I think it was a twenty dollar deposit that you would send her. But that twenty dollars goes to your first. Your first purchase. Did we talk about this? Because I think I remember you having a strong opinion about it. We talked about it behind the scenes. Yes, that's what it was. I do have a strong opinion on it. But well, are you going to share parts of it or not? I guess I will.

[00:27:18] I think you're talking about the memberships on YouTube. I don't remember if it was a membership. It could have been. And I just remember because I looked at because she has a form to register for her sales. And it said you pay twenty dollars. And then but that twenty dollars would go towards your first purchase in in her show. So like it's not like you're losing it. It would go to buying jewelry.

[00:27:47] OK, I don't remember it being a I don't think it was. It could have been a group. I don't remember. Let me put it this way for that scenario. Would does eBay have you spend twenty dollars to create an account and then use that twenty dollars to purchase something? That's just a totally extra step that's useless.

[00:28:09] You know, like I could go on any site and just buy stuff and I don't have to go through an extra step of, oh, you want me to pay twenty dollars to verify that I'm going to be a buyer. OK, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That makes sense. That's just an extra step that's very useless. But. If you're like a little independent seller, it kind of helps you in the sense that, number one, you know, that the person is serious, a serious customer.

[00:28:37] And number two. You're getting something, you know, for your time, like you said, setting up the show, organizing your pieces, running the show. um so i i can see pros and cons to doing it that way i don't think i would do it that way i mean i would have a form to say hey that way if you buy something i have your email and your address but

[00:29:04] i wouldn't require 20 i mean unless i was doing maybe high-end stuff like if i was doing pieces that were hundreds or maybe thousands of dollars but i don't plan on selling any of that on youtube yeah i wouldn't i wouldn't i would i would probably do ebay or do that privately or something like that but um but yeah i mean everybody kind of has their thing you know the whole thing with the

[00:29:33] youtube memberships though when we were talking behind the scenes um my stance on that was why should you pay for a private sale i mean oh yes we did talk about that this is what we talked about like i i did it in the sense um of it maybe being like a private phone call with like a one-on-one and showing you know like a facetime call and showing trays of jewelry and being like okay you can pick

[00:29:59] out you know from this tray or this tray and i'll let you know the price you're doing it on youtube and you're requiring people to pay the for a subscription or you know whatever it is because i don't i haven't been on youtube in a while um but pay for a subscription just to show up to a subscribers only kind of sale for that membership that leaves out so many potential buyers that

[00:30:26] have the money but just don't want to spend it on your channel you know so like you could have somebody who's wanting to spend thousands of dollars with you but they don't want to buy your subscription on your channel they'd rather take their money and go buy gas in their car or something right oh so by having sales just for members of your subscription or whatever it's called i don't remember channel

[00:30:55] memberships that's what it is having the channel membership and having a sale only for those people you're excluding so many other people who might actually outbid the people that are paying for your channel yeah and you make a strong a strong case for that but i will say this i have had people

[00:31:17] say that they would pay for first dibs on something like when i get new stuff i've had people say hey you know i'm willing to pay a little bit more if you let me see your stuff first i'm not saying with the channel membership i'm just saying in general like i've had people tell me that yeah when in general

[00:31:41] for when i go to like church sales especially that is the thing you pay to get in like an hour early there's one church sale here i stopped going into that this year 30 to get in for a two-hour pre-sale absolutely ridiculous um but you know most churches here are do like five or ten dollars to get in and i'm fine with that because i buy a bunch of other stuff other than jewelry um but to to go on to

[00:32:10] what you said about getting first dibs if you're doing a youtube show and you're paying people to come in to get first dibs who's getting the first dibs because if you have 20 people watching that show you know there's 20 people wanting first dibs no no these are people who who like before i even do the youtube show oh you mean like private calls right okay well that i've had people ask me for that

[00:32:36] where they say hey desiree i'll pay a little bit more if you let me see the stuff first before you run it on whatnot or before you sell it on youtube or before you list it on ebay okay that that makes more sense like a private call i thought you meant like the channel memberships and getting first dibs i was like how would that work yeah no no i've had i've had people tell me that and and they say hey you know

[00:33:02] i'm willing to pay a little bit more if you let me see your new stuff first yeah and depending on number one who it is number two what i've got um i'm willing i'm willing to do that i'm willing to do that with certain buyers that i know are are gonna buy and aren't gonna just waste my time for taking the time to even do that yeah but it's something to think about because as you kind of grow in your jewelry

[00:33:31] reselling and you get better at being a reseller and you get better at getting better inventory people will start to um say hey you know i would love that like i had a lady um not too long ago and i think i talked about this on on one of my live calls where she said i just love chico's jewelry and she said if you get a bunch of chico's i'm willing you know to buy it all from you

[00:34:00] you know she's like you don't gotta list it you just tell me what you know how many pieces and how much you want for it so you will get buyers who are like that you know who don't even want to go through the hassle of bidding joining a live show going on ebay they just want to say hey if you've got this that i'm looking for let's make a deal so i think that's something to think that's like with

[00:34:27] me with enamel flowers if you got them i'll take a look at them and buy them right and and you don't want to have to wait for someone to you know run it on whatnot or you know list it on ebay you can just and then you can make that money not only faster but um you'll make more money because you don't have to worry about fees or anything like that well and and that's the other thing um there

[00:34:53] was a seller that lives about probably 30 minutes from me who did a show and i bought a bunch of flowers off her whatnot show and i did a local pickup so i went over and um picked up my items and i asked her do you have any other enamel flowers or you know what's the jewelry selection that you have and she took me down into the basement showed me her little jewelry layout that she has for her whatnot shows and she was showing me all the drawers of jewelry and she's like yeah feel free to go ahead

[00:35:21] and pick make a pile and i'll give you a price i was like all right that's great yeah so i got to see a bunch of jewelry before she put it on whatnot yeah so um in cases like that i'm willing to to be flexible or to work something out because it's it's saving us both time

[00:35:44] you know and it's also it it saves the buyer money because their money will go further you know and then it saves me money because i don't have to pay fees that is true so it's a win-win exactly so um but yeah i think that i think that that's the thing nowadays is a lot of people are looking for

[00:36:12] for alternatives to ebay because obviously ebay isn't what it was even two or three years ago yeah and especially with jewelry um it just seems like there's more and more people trying to get into jewelry

[00:36:31] but yet there's not a whole lot of um i guess the word would be like reliable jewelry resellers i mean there's a i mean i'm not saying there's not any because i know a lot of us are out there we're you know we're ethical we're not scamming people and all that but i just noticed that people tend to

[00:36:58] it's like they not only do they like my jewelry but they like me like people like you yeah and they want to shop with you and they want to support you and i think that seems to be more it's becoming more apparent nowadays than it was before where before it was just like oh i just want jewelry i don't care who's selling it whoever has what i want that's what i want to buy but i've had a lot of people say oh desiree i want to shop with you or i want to support you or when is your next

[00:37:25] show so i can be on you know yeah oh yeah those personal connections are nice to have yeah and i think it it goes a long way as it relates to your business and your income no definitely definitely all right so tell us about your um upcoming whatnot show yeah so my whatnot show i'm planning on it to be the 12th of may uh that might change depending

[00:37:54] what happens because i can't predict the future um but i'm going to have all five dollar starts and it's going to be a bunch of like i said earlier with haskell trefari coro monet weiss um and there's just going to be a ton of vintage jewelry we're gonna have a lot of fun i'm going to talk about how i'm going to do my shows my whatnot shows in the upcoming future and i think that's all about the show

[00:38:23] all right so you're gonna have this on whatnot uh the date as of now is may 12th what time is it going to be it's going to be roughly about 9 30 10 o'clock p.m central time okay so hopefully that's not going to be too late i know for me in pacific time that's not going to be late at all um about how many how many pieces are you going to be running in that show do you know do you have an idea

[00:38:53] every show i like to at least get 100 in um this show might be because it's higher end stuff it might be like 50 or 60. um but i'll i'll try my best to run 100 pieces okay and so your shows last about what an hour two hours two to four hours usually two to four okay okay all right so and then what about

[00:39:17] people who may want to buy like lots or or mystery bags are you gonna have any of those available um not on whatnot because with the when you call something a mystery on whatnot you have to give a floor price a middle price and a high price and as i probably mentioned like in you know in my first

[00:39:41] episode of talking to you um the price varies depending on who it is you know because i could say oh this thing's worth like 20 but in your mind you might say oh no it's worth five bucks you know so each of us have different price values for different items and i think it's kind of stupid to say oh well this thing could be worth this and it could be worth between this and this but you're gonna have to

[00:40:10] decide what it you know what it's worth yeah okay so that's why i don't do mysteries on whatnot but if you want to mystery bags or jars you know you can go to my website heartlandpicker.com and i've got a ton of them up there right now and hopefully in the next few weeks i'll have some more ideas for you okay yeah i don't really i've never done any mystery jars boxes i've never done that on

[00:40:38] on any platform but i have done like jewelry bags you know but you but you can see what's in it you know it's not like it's a mystery and i do really well with those so i'm thinking about doing some of those um because one time i did a show on poshmark just jewelry bags and i sold out and then to this

[00:41:02] day people are still asking me when are you going to do another jewelry bag show and um so i i i know i can do really well with them on poshmark live i don't know about what not but yeah when i did my mystery bag drops on uh my website what i did was i put for the silver tone bags i put a sterling ring

[00:41:24] in one of them as like a little little hidden gem and in my own bags i put in a what was the last i think the last thing was a 14 karat gold pendant i put in um it's just like a little mystery treasure thing and one of the people on tick tock bought the silver tone bags and she did a video on it i wasn't expecting it like i didn't know she did videos and i sent the bag out she got it she did the video

[00:41:52] and when i watched the video when she unwrapped the bag and saw the little note that said congratulations you found the sterling ring and she looked inside the bag her face was like shut up and she like she puts on the ring and goes oh my gosh i'm i'm keeping this oh that's so sweet i love that i can send you that video later it's so funny yeah tag me on uh tick tock definitely definitely

[00:42:20] but it's things like that if you add little incentives to your mystery bags people will flood you know whatever site you're selling on and buy them up yeah i try to do that i mean unless it's an actual craft junk jewelry bag um for the wearable jewelry i try to make them all like like honestly you you could wear it like you could wear it and keep it and it looks nice it's not you know tarnished or

[00:42:48] broken or missing stones like all of that i say for the craft junk lot bags but the wearable stuff i make sure it's nice stuff some of it is signed some of it's not but i always try to make sure that it's it's decent stuff and stuff that you literally could if you wanted to wear it you could definitely

[00:43:10] yep totally so all right brandon well um is there anything else you want to talk about before i let you go um i don't think so other than you know just adding i'm adding my listings on my website heartland picker.com doing my whatnot shows it's finally over my four years and hats off yes yes congratulations

[00:43:39] like i said i know i mean i didn't i didn't have a cap and gown and i didn't walk because i finished my degree online but i know the feeling i know the feeling of oh my gosh it's over i don't have to worry about this anymore i'm done so i know exactly how you feel and you know i'm very proud of you because

[00:44:02] not many college students you know do what you're doing so you're already like so far ahead i think well and it was i will say in the last four years it was very hard to juggle my business business and classes together yeah especially with communicating with customers because there would be tons of customers who are saying well when's your next show when's this when's this happening and i'm like i can't really tell you because

[00:44:30] i've got college stuff to do and i don't know when the next show will be and just stuff like that so it's finally nice for all the education to be over and i can just go full on into this business and what are you getting your degree in i went as a major for multimedia journalism and a minor in marketing communications oh that's awesome yeah definitely that's totally my jam communication

[00:44:59] too yeah yeah uh when well when i went to school multimedia journalism wasn't an option so it was just uh communications uh communications is what they called it gotcha you know but that was included in it they just called it communications and it had broadcasts and writing and everything so um and journalism so but now they have more specific degrees like like i probably would have done that if that was an option

[00:45:28] when i went oh yeah yeah oh yeah so cool well thank you so much brandon i always enjoy talking to you and um you know i'll definitely be checking out your sales so everybody i will have brandon's information linked in the description and in the show notes so if you're not already following him please make sure you do and then um i don't know i'm sure i'll be talking to you again soon

[00:45:56] most definitely and if you ever want to do a youtube show together i'm up for it oh yeah yeah i would love to do that i think that would be fun i know we talked about that not too long ago too definitely yeah all right thanks brandon i'll definitely talk to you soon thank you