Ebay selling cycles?

[rickshaw]

Having been a long haunter of EvilBay, I've noticed that there appears to be cycles of selling.  One particular kit will be sale in relatively large numbers for a few weeks and then disappear almost completely from the auctions to be replaced by another.  I was wondering if anybody else had noticed that?  At one point there will be no examples of a kit available, then there will be a flood and then they'll disappear again.   A good example is the older Airfix Canberra.  Rare as hen's teeth a year ago, now relatively abundant.

[lenny100]

usualy find its because a kit has gone for a silly price because there are none on the site, it then becomes the kit to put up hopeing for the silly price again utill the next silly priced
kit comes along

[Captain Canada]

Ebay has been selling bikes ever since it's inception !

Sorry....couldn't resist 

[dumaniac]

yes = I have noticed that when a particular goes in ebay after a long absence, it often goes for big dollars.  It is followed in short order by about 3 other examples of that kit and the price declines with each sale until there is just one bidder.  Then the drought sets in again with no kits for months.

and thanks Captain Canada for that left field humour - not sure if other can handle it

cheers

Bernie

[PR19_Kit]

Ebay has been selling bikes ever since it's inception !

Sorry....couldn't resist 

Very true, I even bought one. 

[Librarian]

One reason is mass greed, of which I am guilty. A while ago, whilst trawling the great E of Bay I found a rare kit for sale, a copy of which I had in the stash. It sold for silly money as it was the only one for sale at that time. Usually I give away or swap kits but greedy little munchkin that I was, I put mine up for sale only to realise that six other individuals had obviously had the same idea . I withdrew and still have the kit for a rainy day.

[Dizzyfugu]

usualy find its because a kit has gone for a silly price because there are none on the site, it then becomes the kit to put up hopeing for the silly price again utill the next silly priced
kit comes along

Yup. It's also because production batch might just be much bigger than demand at any rate, so that there's a lot of over-stocks and dead weight at resellers. They have to move the stuffa after a while, prices drop, and shops or smaller resellers buy some resale boxes and try to get rid of the kits one by one, trying to save a margin.

I remember the Airfix Nimrod to be a similar case: small rage when new, but there are not many peaple who buy or build such a big thing. Prices dropped dramatically, IIRC, and now the numbers on ebay have settled to normal rates.

[zenrat]

So i'm thinking how could evil-bay be manipulated to get currently absent kits to be sold at sensible prices?

Maybe if 2 modellers got together and listed the desired kit (using a pic gleaned of the interweb if they didn't actually have a copy of he kit) and then shill bid it up to a stupid price (obviously you'd have to ensure the "right" person won it or it could be embarrassing).  This might bring out some kits from other sellers and maybe one could be bought for a sensible price?
Obviously evil-bay would take their cut of the fake auctions selling price so you'd have to take that into account when bidding on the cheaper ones.

All Allegedly and hypothetically of course.