Storage Auctions
Online Storage Auctions => Online Storage Auctions => Topic started by: Travis on February 10, 2014, 01:07:03 PM
-
Looks like it finally happened. I knew they were up to something. Storage Battles is merging with Storage Treasures under the Storage Treasures name. In a way this is good for us. Instead of there being 3 major online storage auction sites, there is now two. On the other hand, it's going to be tough to compete against a site like this. However, I'm still banking that in the long run facilities will prefer our site over theirs because we don't charge buyer or seller fees. Only time will tell.
http://onlinestorageauctions.com/storage-treasures-auctions-earn-25-less/
-
Looks like it finally happened. I knew they were up to something. Storage Battles is merging with Storage Treasures under the Storage Treasures name. In a way this is good for us. Instead of there being 3 major online storage auction sites, there is now two. On the other hand, it's going to be tough to compete against a site like this. However, I'm still banking that in the long run facilities will prefer our site over theirs because we don't charge buyer or seller fees. Only time will tell.
digitaljournal.com/pr/1729297
This has been coming for a few months now. When ST told me they would like to have me write for them (with full access to the TV shows stars .... whoopee !) they indicated there were big things coming. I can't imagine something bigger than this, unless they were to buy Travis' site too !
-
This has been coming for a few months now. When ST told me they would like to have me write for them (with full access to the TV shows stars .... whoopee !) they indicated there were big things coming. I can't imagine something bigger than this, unless they were to buy Travis' site too !
Not for sale. ;D I'm still confident that OSA will be the top site in this niche. It may take 5 years, but it's coming. I'm just going to keep working on the site, making it better & more user friendly. Up until now, I haven't gone to any of the industry trade shows. I'm going to start going to the major ones this year. I've got to get the word out.
My philosophy is this: If there were two lemonade stands right next to each other, one selling glasses for a dollar and one giving away glasses for free, I think most people would choose the free lemonade.
-
I think most people would choose the free lemonade.
Don't be so sure. Most people are wired to ask themselves, if it costs less or if it's free, then what's wrong with it?
I had a fridge out on my tree belt with a sign that said "FREE" and it sat there for a week. So I changed the sign to $50 and the next day someone stole it.
-
Don't be so sure. Most people are wired to ask themselves, if it costs less or if it's free, then what's wrong with it?
I had a fridge out on my tree belt with a sign that said "FREE" and it sat there for a week. So I changed the sign to $50 and the next day someone stole it.
That makes sense. But let's say you were selling a shelf stereo worth $50. Would you list it on Craigslist or eBay?
-
But let's say you were selling a shelf stereo worth $50. Would you list it on Craigslist or eBay?
I'd list it on CL because of the shipping cost saved and because there are way too many being sold on eBay for next to nothing.
-
While I still admire your tenacity I have to say that peoples' perception of "free" often falls back to the old saw "If it's to good to be true, it probably isn't".
-
I hate the SB interface.... It's also a very slow site.
-
I hate the SB interface.... It's also a very slow site.
Do you bid/buy lockers online ?
-
Yeah I only bought 1 online before, still selling the contents from it, paid $820 + 10%, so 902. Currently at 4034.24 on it, but I think it will end up between 5-6k when I'm done.
-
Yeah I only bought 1 online before, still selling the contents from it, paid $820 + 10%, so 902. Currently at 4034.24 on it, but I think it will end up between 5-6k when I'm done.
That's a great buy !
Which online service did you use?
-
Storage Battles
I think their site's under a DOS attack, because It's not working :/
-
I called them and they said they had 100,000 users on the site and it was causing it to crawl and not function properly..
-
I called them and they said they had 100,000 users on the site and it was causing it to crawl and not function properly..
Probably 99,000 of those came after they referenced here on the forum. ;D
-
The site is completely down now... Some auctions are ending and people can't run the final bid up.. They told me they will not reset the timer, we'll see how that plays out.
I was able to place bids on 3 of them knowing that the site was crashing, we'll see what happens and what I end up stealing.
-
The site is completely down now... Some auctions are ending and people can run the final bid up.. They told me they will not reset the timer, we'll see how that plays out.
I was able to place bids on 3 of them knowing that the site was crashing, we'll see what happens and what I end up stealing.
Reliability will be a huge factor in this niche. If their crashes during traffic spikes, sellers will lose money and buyers will be furious. I can only imagine the complications they'll have when trying to merge sites.
-
Just tried to access Storage Battles, got the following message:
-
Reliability cost $$, where I work as a systems administrator we have to load test all our environments to ensure issues like that don't happen. Paying for Bandwidth, Clustered Server, Load Balancers gets very costly. We're talking 100's of thousands you have to invest in infrastructure and that hardware needs to be refreshed.
Or you leverage amazon cloud services and just pay a monthly charge and let them do the work, I have no clue what external services charge for high availability under crushing load.
But the good news is, if you have that much load, you should be generating a lot of $$ to pay for these costs.
-
I hope it stays down for another 30 minutes, I would love to see how this plays out. Theirs one locker I bid on that's going to straight back to home depot.
-
Reliability cost $$, where I work as a systems administrator we have to load test all our environments to ensure issues like that don't happen. Paying for Bandwidth, Clustered Server, Load Balancers gets very costly. We're talking 100's of thousands you have to invest in infrastructure and that hardware needs to be refreshed.
Or you leverage amazon cloud services and just pay a monthly charge and let them do the work, I have no clue what external services charge for high availability under crushing load.
But the good news is, if you have that much load, you should be generating a lot of $$ to pay for these costs.
What do you think the cloud service would cost monthly to handle that kind of traffic?
-
Amazon..
Name:
3-Tier Auto-scalable Web Application Solution
Includes:
1 Load Balancer, 2 Web Servers, 2 App Servers, 1 High Availability Database Server, 30 GB of Storage; 120 GB of Data Transfer
This is $1240 a month..
Now, if your data transfer goes to 100 Terrabytes a month, it's more like 20,000 monthly.. If you need more servers to handle the load cause the code is a processing hog, then it goes up.
You won't know what you need, best to hire a consultant and build a solution and project different scenario's and be able to scale to those solutions when needed.
-
I hope it stays down for another 30 minutes, I would love to see how this plays out. Theirs one locker I bid on that's going to straight back to home depot.
Looks like your wish has come true.
-
You won't know what you need, best to hire a consultant and build a solution and project different scenario's and be able to scale to those solutions when needed.
Do you consult? If so, it would be great to have someone with your expertise once we outgrow our server.
-
I'm not the right person, I know all about it, but I'm not the person to lay out the plan. I'm a developer and I work on the server administration team. I can script and code and that's my primary job function to automate a lot of processes.
I would contact amazon and talk to their sales people and get a free consultation from them, because you are thinking about using their products. We do that all the time here, we bring in multiple vendors, ask them all kinds of questions. Draw out the scenarios and have them prepare quotes and then we choose one of the vendors. That cost should be free, they are trying to earn your business.
-
Looks like your wish has come true.
We'll see what happens, can't wait to take the $10 locker to home depot..
-
I am/ was high bidder on 2, then the site crashed, I hope I get them.
-
We'll see what happens, can't wait to take the $10 locker to home depot..
My guess is they will have an "out" to extend the auction due to technical problems.
A "soft close" provision would take care of that....no bids in the last 1 minute or so of the auction, they extend the close time.
eBay was thinking of implementing that but there was such an uproar it never happened.
If you and vanilla get your lockers I will be very surprised. Such contingencies are usually thought out in advance I would guess, but time will give us the answer.
-
I am/ was high bidder on 2, then the site crashed, I hope I get them.
How far from your home are the two auctions you had bid on?
-
I really feel like this crash could have been prevented. It's really poor planning on their part and the buyers and sellers are the one's suffering. They should have anticipated the increased traffic and stayed one step ahead. It just doesn't make sense to me. They probably make $1200 in commission on every 7-10 auctions. Instead, they go the cheap route and it ends up costing them and the storage facilities tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars.
As of now, their site has been down over an hour.
-
vanillagorilla,
You're only going to get one of them, I took the other from you. I was going to let you have it, but my dad wanted it for some odd reason.. I don't think it's worth the price it was bid up to.
-
vanillagorilla,
You're only going to get one of them, I took the other from you. I was going to let you have it, but my dad wanted it for some odd reason.. I don't think it's worth the price it was bid up to.
And Luke, how far are the auctions from your home as well?
-
15 miles and 22 miles - they were in 2 places from the same facility.
-
I won't travel more then 30 miles to get something, I don't even look if it's over that and I only buy when I have room and I don't even look otherwise.
I have a trailer so most lockers fit in 1 load, sometimes 2, depending on weight.
-
vanillagorilla,
You're only going to get one of them, I took the other from you. I was going to let you have it, but my dad wanted it for some odd reason.. I don't think it's worth the price it was bid up to.
What was it bid up to (as best you know) before the crash? And what size locker is it?
-
Last I seen it at was $710, small locker 6 x 4. Total Gamble, I have some theories about it and it has something to do with my signature.
I'm hoping I got the $10 one, I think I'll get at least $350 from home depot.
-
The site kind of back up but it's not showing won actions unless I lost them all, or they extended the time.
-
I don't see the auctions listed anymore.. And I have nothing in my account profile..
This looks like a complete mess.
-
I was able to pull up the expired auctions from my emails. It shows me as the highest bidder and the auction is closed.
But it doesn't show it as won in my account.
-
I called the storage facility, they said they are in emails with SB and they have no clue either, they haven't been notified of the winners.
-
Luke, That one was a gamble, but It looked just like another I bought that was my best ever. As far as the other one, I dont know yet either, but it had a Ferrari fender in it, so I hope I got it.
-
I called SB, I gave them the auction #'s of the ones I won, They are going to send out emails to the facility and me letting them know.
vanillagorilla, if I was you you should call them also, and give them the auction # of the one with the car parts so they can send out the confirmation so you can pick up your items.
-
I think the earlier observations about SB's user interface and site performance are dead-on. It's hard to build a business and invest in everything - marketing, sales, promotion, etc. and still continue to re-invent the site every couple years to stay on top of scalability and growth. I'm working with a team to build a new offering in this space, at ebidstorageauctions (dot) com and we're excited to offer a fresh perspective in the market. I think ultimately there's room for multiple players in online storage auctions, and the market will sort out which approach and pricing model is best over time. Like Travis said, time will tell.
-
I think the earlier observations about SB's user interface and site performance are dead-on. It's hard to build a business and invest in everything - marketing, sales, promotion, etc. and still continue to re-invent the site every couple years to stay on top of scalability and growth. I'm working with a team to build a new offering in this space, at ebidstorageauctions (dot) com and we're excited to offer a fresh perspective in the market. I think ultimately there's room for multiple players in online storage auctions, and the market will sort out which approach and pricing model is best over time. Like Travis said, time will tell.
First of all, welcome to the forum. Good to have you here. I agree, I think there is room in the marketplace for a few online storage auction sites, but there has been a flood of new sites over the past several months. In my opinion, I think most will fail because they will never be able to rank well in the search engines. New sites in this niche have to go up against gigantic sites like OnlineStorageAuctions.com, StorageTreasures.com, AuctionZip.com and a handful of other well ranking sites for position in Google search results. It'll be an uphill battle.
-
Ok, now it shows me as winning all 3 auctions and I got the winning bid emails. The glitch probably saved me a couple of hundred.
-
Ok, now it shows me as winning all 3 auctions and I got the winning bid emails. The glitch probably saved me a couple of hundred.
Good for you...bad for the storage facilities. ;)
-
Travis, another "service" you should really push with your site is that OSA.com will assist the facility in preparing the auction. You can offer advice on picture taking, descriptions, and ensuring that the auction ends at a favorable time. Many times on SB in my area, the auctions end on weird times because everything is PST. There's an auction coming up that ends 3 a.m. local time because the facility put 12 a.m. rather than 12 p.m. I'll be up to see what happens, but I don't think it's to the facilities advantage to end the auction in the middle of the night. Even midnight is ridiculous.
-
Travis, another "service" you should really push with your site is that OSA.com will assist the facility in preparing the auction. You can offer advice on picture taking, descriptions, and ensuring that the auction ends at a favorable time. Many times on SB in my area, the auctions end on weird times because everything is PST. There's an auction coming up that ends 3 a.m. local time because the facility put 12 a.m. rather than 12 p.m. I'll be up to see what happens, but I don't think it's to the facilities advantage to end the auction in the middle of the night. Even midnight is ridiculous.
We've actually written some articles for sellers on how to have a successful online storage auction. Although, we plan on expanding on that by adding more articles and training videos. We will eventually get to that, but right now we're swamped with the site redesign and trying to transfer hundreds of articles from AuctionsTX.com. I would need three of me to get caught up with everything!
-
There's an auction coming up that ends 3 a.m. local time because the facility put 12 a.m. rather than 12 p.m.
Round here that wouldn't be legal. The storage lien law in Utah says the auction has to be held in line with industry normal standards to be legal. Typical lean auctions would not be held before 8am or after 6pm, so holding one outside those hours would open the facility (and possibly the buyer) up to potential lawsuits.
-
Looks like it finally happened. I knew they were up to something. Storage Battles is merging with Storage Treasures under the Storage Treasures name. In a way this is good for us. Instead of there being 3 major online storage auction sites, there is now two. On the other hand, it's going to be tough to compete against a site like this. However, I'm still banking that in the long run facilities will prefer our site over theirs because we don't charge buyer or seller fees. Only time will tell.
digitaljournal.com/pr/1729297
In my state dont know how it is in others but prices stay under 200 on units online? What happed? People use to jack the price up to an average of 800.00 for nothing! Have people become smater or is it they arent watching there favorite storage shows like they used to? I want to know what has happened.