Welcome back to another episode of the Reseller's
Mindset Podcast. My name is Mike, also known
as the Used Book Guy on YouTube, along with my
friend and fellow full -time reseller, Johnny
B. We help people start and grow their reselling
businesses from the ground up. We also have a
weekly Zoom call and private Discord for all
YouTube members. Head on over to youtube .com
backslash usebookguy to join the channel and
gain access to the full -length podcast, Zoom
call, and private Discord today. Let's get into
this week's episode. What is up, everybody? Welcome
back to another episode of Reseller's Mindset
Podcast. Johnny's wonderful, amazing topic today,
bulk. bulking season for those watching over
on youtube i'm flexing looking like arnold schwarzenegger
right now but he's talking about like getting
gay lords of books and stuff that's not we're
on two different planes here but i will say bulk
has been a huge beneficiary to my business this
year so far but the bulk johnny gets into is
way different than the bulk that uh the used
book guy likes to get into right you guys know
i don't want to be digging through gay lords
and Unfortunately, I can't fit a Gaylord in the
trunk of the Lamborghini, right? So it's a completely
different operation. So I'm going to let them
take it away on the bulk front, and I'm just
going to chime in and give my two cents. Sure.
And contrary to Mike's upsell here, I don't deal
in Gaylords that often. I deal in them every
now and then. But I've always done bulk probably
since the beginning, whether it's buying out
from an estate sale. or buying from mom and pops
or an occasional thrift store buyout i want everything
on your shelf plus what you got in the back and
or library clean outs so gaylords They sound
easy, but they come with a whole lot of complexities.
There are certain things to be aware of, who
you're getting them from, where they're pulling
them from, and all these little other nuances.
And we'll try to cover most of those on the podcast
today. But before we get into the fancy life
of Gaylords, let's just talk about estate sales.
So you walk into a state sale. You got lured
in because they showed a blurry photo of one
shelf of books. You get there, and it's a whole
library wing of books, and they all look spiffy.
At least half of them you want for, I don't know,
eBay, if you're an eBay seller. If you're not
an eBay seller, you think they're going to scan
good for Amazon. Let's say you're on the scanning
side. You scan a couple. Everything looks good.
I'm not going to say waste your time because
you're going to be exact if you scan every single
one, but if it were me, I walk over to one of
the little worker bees and who's the man or woman
in charge here? Is it you? And they're going
to say no, because usually the person running
around is normally the person that doesn't make
the calls. So I asked them to skip this person
up for me whenever they got a moment and I'll
wait there patiently. And eventually they'll
come around and I'm like, look, I want them all,
but I don't want to pay per piece like you got
them here. What kind of deal can we work out?
they'll hem -haw in a moment oh they want them
all because most of them view books as worthless
and a pain because they're going to have to deal
with it at the end of the estate sale anyway
so it'll go one of two ways one they'll tell
you we want to wait until the very last day because
we want as much money for this family as possible
which is fair um and if they say that like okay
how much for me to buy them all right now if
i'm concerned that they're going to get picked
over and they'll give me uh kind of higher number
than i would like and i'll go for a slightly
lower number which they will then accept nine
times out of ten or it'll go the other way um
they can't produce a number for you because they're
looking at i don't know hundreds and hundreds
of books and they can't come up with a number
and it's really tempting to throw out a number
yourself do not do this you wait till they're
done with their brain exploding you can kind
of guide them to a number like Look, you're offering
to have out. I do buy the pound, like 15 cents
a pound. You got a lot of weight here. They don't
know how to calculate weight in their heads.
They don't. So you coming in with what you would
normally pay on a pound basis is a good idea
because it gives them a guideline. You are speaking
first, and that's technically not the right play.
But if they're struggling, you want to speed
this along because time is money, folks. So we
want to get in and out as quickly as we can.
And then. Once the number's agreed upon, comes
the fun part. How do you get it to wherever you're
trying to take it to, right? You got to have
the right equipment. I have dollies that fit
inside houses and carts that fit inside houses,
like the door frames, because all doors are different.
Does it have stairs? Are you going to have the
fun fight the stair game? Was it stored in an
attic? Is it in a basement? Blah, blah, blah.
I prefer tubs than their crappy boxes they provide.
So I usually... When I'm going to do this kind
of run, I'm always prepared. I just have tubs
ready to go. And I'll unpack and load them in
there because that's how I'm going to store them
anyway. And so I can get to processing them.
Put them on the truck. My tubs are stackable.
So I can stack them in the bed of my truck. And
they got holes in the lids. I didn't make the
holes. They come this way. And I just run a rope
through there. So I can stack three high and
drive 70 miles down the highway just fine. I
think. I mean, in full transparency, I approach
it on a category basis. I used to do free pickups
when I first started because you trade work for
money right in the beginning. Nowadays, like
if a tractor trailer pulled up outside and it
was full of gay lords of books and I said, hey,
you can have these, I would say keep on driving,
mister. Someone else will take them. Now, this
is just the experience I've had dealing with
bulk books, right? I don't have a truck. I got
a little Ultima. Yeah, I can fit, you know, I've
had that thing filled to the top with books before.
It's just a lot more work in today's environment
of selling on Amazon for a lot less profit if
I compare it to the other categories that I'm
willing to buy bulk in, which is DVDs and CDs.
I still have bulk book sources, but they are
quality, right? Like when the libraries reach
out to me. These are all fresh donations that
nobody's seen besides the person that literally
dropped them off at the library. So this is like
the cream of the crop stuff. So I don't have
a problem loading up the car if it's going to
be loaded with bangers. But I'm here to tell
you, I've had some terrible bulk experiences
where you have your free pickup ad and you show
up and, you know, it's a mess. There's rats in
the boxes. There's roaches in the boxes. I think
it's. I think bulk is so glorified to the new
seller that you don't realize how many things
can go sideways, right? You're just like, I'm
going to get so much. And you're like, you're
not thinking about the rats, the roaches, the
microwave cookbooks, the spending your whole
day and you make absolutely nothing. And then
you have to get rid of it all. It's a lot of
work. And you're right. It's overly glorified
on social medias and our YouTube channels. the
guys doing on the youtube channels couple things
there uh sometimes they have people do it for
them and then the work doesn't come out in the
video they just well we we picked up 20 gaylords
we got this amount of money key words in there
we um It's more than just the person on the screen
doing it. More than likely, it's just going to
be you starting out if you're going to attempt
bulk. And Mike's absolutely right. What do you
do with the stuff left over? Because it ain't
good for eBay. It ain't good for Amazon, but
it's there still. It has to go away somehow,
some way. There's lots of ways. I tend to, if
you can, you're not going to have this probably
off the gate, but if you got another reselling
buddy who sells a certain type of thing and you
got a lot of this type of certain thing, It's
just a flat amount per piece kind of deal. Barring
that, well, you're looking at what Mike talks
about, Second and Charles. If you don't got a
Second and Charles, well, there's McKay's. If
you don't got a McKay's, unfortunately, bottom
of the barrel is half -priced books. I hate half
-priced books because they trap you there. The
other two at least let you leave. I literally,
dude, I don't even care. Like, my time was worth...
more to me now so it's funny i actually got to
do this maybe i'll do it today i took a photo
of my last library pick up all the duds at the
storage unit and i literally have somebody come
meet me at the storage unit five minutes away
and load up their car and take it like i'm not
taking it to donate anymore that that itself
is too much time for me and too much work right
i gotta reload the car then i gotta go to the
the you know whatever thrift store i hate Then
I got to unload the car again. So now I just
say, hey, throw it up on Facebook Marketplace
for free. And I literally get rid of stuff the
same day. And I got all my money out of it, right?
I think that's like another thing with the bulk.
Case in pennies, right? People don't want to
get rid of the stuff, man. They want to do lots.
I'll just make an eBay lot. Yeah. There was like
five people in the universe of media selling
that. that can actually do lots and actually
make money. Like that is it. Like out of the
millions and millions of booksellers, there's
maybe five of them that can actually make money
off it. And that's literally a focus that they
have in their business. Me and you, right? Like
I get all those, I forget the kids' names, like
the old books, but it's like, I don't know. Party
boys. There you go. Or like the Agatha Christie's.
And you're like, oh, I'm over here about to cook
them up. If you're dumping Agatha, I'll take
her, man. I'm dumping that as far as fast as
I can get rid of it. Send it my way. I sell Agatha
all day on eBay. It's just for me, right? Like
it doesn't work. Like 100 % of the time, it doesn't
work. The reason I have the bulk book, you know.
that i do get involved in is because it's real
quality stuff if it's free book pickups i don't
do those no more i am not interested in it sure
if another library approaches me and says hey
do you want to work with me 100 this is this
is like good stuff so maybe this maybe this transitions
us into the idea of new sellers and bulk inventory
and you know going on Google or Facebook marketplace
and typing in Gaylords. And then the first thing
you pop up and the biggest red flag is going
to be great for reselling, right? Not picked
over, right? Like these are words that are like,
and in full transparency, you all can go find
me on Facebook marketplace if you can find my
listings. I put, when I put them up for free,
Johnny, I even put in there that I scanned them
for Amazon. So I do the... The universe, a great
service because I'm an honest guy and I don't
want somebody like me coming to get my books
thinking they're going to be able to make money
on Amazon. I literally put right my listing,
scan for Amazon FBA. What's up, Amazon tellers?
We wanted to take a second to talk about GoToLister,
the software me and Johnny both use to list and
manage our inventory and grow our businesses.
With the fastest listing speeds out there and
built -in profit analytics, it's a no -brainer.
Easily and quickly have items available for sale
using 2D barcodes and get more for your items
with its built -in smart pricing. Make sure to
check out the 30 -day free trial at gotolister
.com backslash Mike or using the link in the
description below. Okay, before I move into the
Gaylord topic, two things I want to focus that
Mike said. So the two biggest hacks in reselling,
in my opinion, is if you can get stuff to come
to you. And if you can get stuff to leave from
you where you don't have to go anywhere, that
is huge. If you can figure out both methodologies
where you got inventory coming to you inbound
and it's leaving outbound the stuff you don't
want, you are in a fine position to really go
ham on your business, really. Yeah. And I don't
even think it's really money related to like
what you're saying. Like people are probably
thinking like, oh, like. why not just list the
books on facebook marketplace for like 20 or
40 bucks right a carload of books no like i'm
literally i'm winning in the process game not
the money game i already made all my money off
of this i just need it gone so when in two weeks
i get reached out again i have this space in
the storage unit and For everybody out there,
like, oh, just get a bigger storage unit. And
then you just got a bunch of junk sitting around.
Anybody knows, like, I'm turning burn. Let's
get through this stuff as fast as we possibly
can. So what Johnny's saying is, right, like,
it doesn't always have to be money motivated,
right? You just need it gone. And you level up
your processes, not necessarily your bank account.
But you already got your bank account leveled
up from scanning through all the stuff you got.
And I lied, I had two more on this. And then
we can talk about gay lords. The other one is
mom and pops. If instead of the chains like McKay's,
Half Price, Second and Charles, if you can network
with them where they're going to, again, this
is similar to what I was talking about, having
a certain buyer. Well, the certain buyer is now
a mom and pop store. If they buy, like he was
saying, Agatha Christie's all day long and they
aren't good for Amazon, eBay. Well, guess where
those Agathas are going. But again, if you can
make them come to you instead of you going to
their store, that's the. Most ideal. And either
they're going to give you cash money or they're
going to give you store credit. They give you
store credit, well, you can shop around, assuming
that's a store worth something. If it's not,
just take the money and source elsewhere. Another
big one I've seen, and it's a little bit more
work intensive, is I've seen people do pop -up
book sales. They'll have a monthly book sale,
either at a storage unit or an outdoor sale kind
of event, to get rid of their duds that way,
monetize a little bit. However, that does take
a little bit of your time because you got to
set it up. More than likely, you're going to
have to organize it. And lastly, you're going
to have to sit there. And then you're going to
have to clean up what doesn't sell at the end.
Unless you're doing it month by month and it
just rolls into the next one. Now we can talk
about Gaylords. All right, I'm going to start
this out. I'm going to go hard in the paint here
right from the beginning. Anybody that's selling
Gaylords on Facebook Marketplace or Google .com.
It's picked over, dude, and you're never going
to be able to convince me otherwise. The people
you see that win with Gaylords in the media space,
in any space, they are literally getting it from
the source. Think about this. Do you think these
huge media players you see with their conveyor
belts, you think they're buying their Gaylords
off Facebook marketplace? No, they're coming
from the back rooms of libraries. They're coming
from literally the sources, the best possible
sources, because that's the only way you can
make money in bulk is if it's from not picked
over further up the stream. So anybody that's
out there like, hey, I'll sell you a Gaylord,
right? It's a great price. And why wouldn't,
okay, as greedy as people are, if I had a Gaylord
of unscanned media, why wouldn't I just do it
myself? How many people out there, there are
a few exceptions to this, right? Like some of
these like Amazon liquidation stores, they get
Gaylords and they don't want to deal with the
books. 100%, I know people in our group deal
with those types of. pallets of books from the
Amazon return stores, and they're pretty decent.
That would probably be the only exception to
anybody just stumbling into, like, where do these
people get the Gaylord of books from? Why are
they even interested in getting a Gaylord of
books? Clearly, they probably are interested
in books or selling books. So this idea that
somebody's selling a Gaylord and it's not picked
over, there's 100 % a lie on Facebook Marketplace,
and for the most part, in any marketplace. And
I've had... Tons of one -on -ones with people
that have gotten literally burned by people saying,
hey, this Gaylord's not picked over. And then
you come to find out, well, yeah, we are kind
of skimming the good stuff off the top, right?
It's like I joked about in one, you know, last
YouTube video I did about the DVDs. And I said.
you know what i do i'll say this gaylord and
the first one you scan will be real profitable
on top and then i'll bury one that's real profitable
at the very end so the first one you scanned
you're like yes we're going to get rich and you
go through all the junk and then the very last
one you scan is like oh yeah look look let's
buy another one johnny look at this like it's
the last one we got I think it's a con game,
dude. It's like the guys growing up in Philly,
they'd be on the train, and they got their three
little shells with the ball underneath, right?
It's 100 % the same thing. I think it's all a
scam. If I was a scammer, I wouldn't put them
on the top. I'd put them at the bottom. I would
always put them at the bottom, never the top,
because they'll be hating themselves, and then
they get to the bottom, they're all excited again,
right? Because if you start at the top, and you
finish that, then it's just misery afterwards.
See, I'd flip the script. All the good shit would
go on the bottom. But I'm going to share my screen
here, and I'm going to go over some terminology
that you all should be aware of. If you are listening
to someone on a podcast, don't worry. I'm going
to read it aloud. But if you want to hop over
to YouTube and follow along and take down some
notes, feel free to do so. And while you're there,
make sure to like and subscribe to the Use Book
Guide channel because we like subscribers. Shameless
plug. Shameless plug. This is the first time
in podcast history this screen is actually going
to be shared. i think so in full discretion i
got this from omar on his website books pro he
has a little pdf he can download i read through
it a lot of it was old hat but i did like this
certain page in here and that's kind of what
inspired me to do this topic so at the bottom
here in bulk book purchases loads are categorized
into three based on the quality of the books
raw Donated, unprocessed books. He's got some
prices here which may or may not be up to date.
Plus the Gaylord and Pallet cost. Shelf picks.
Books sold on local stores and later collected.
Gaylord and Pallet, plus the Gaylord and Pallet
cost. And then salvage is the last one. Worst
condition books, also lowest accept rate. And
then some other commonly used terms. Scanned.
Scanned by another online retailer. Sorted. Sorted
by category. Cost per pound, price by weight,
and cost. Unscanned, not scanned by an online
retailer. Unsorted, not sorted by a category.
So these are key terms. Whenever you're purchasing
pallets, in my opinion, you should be asking
the person you're trying to buy them from. If
you do not ask these questions and you buy them
blind, just willy -nilly, that's on you. And
now I will stop sharing my screen. No, dude,
see, there's a problem with that, man, because
I know this firsthand. You can buy Gaylord from
me, dude. Right. I'm just trying to sell stuff
like I'm going to tell you whatever you want
to hear. Let's be real. Yeah. Barring the fact
that they just outright lie to you. Yeah, that's
what I'm saying. Like, ah, it's I personally
have at least asked the questions, right? I haven't
come across a single reputable, great, uplifting.
Gaylord buying experience from any single person
I've done coaching calls with for the four plus
years I've had this YouTube channel. Yeah. So
for me, like that's proof enough that I'm just
like, there ain't no shot. Right. Like, and it's
been, you know, some of these companies are more
reputable in quotation marks and it's the exact
opposite. They say one thing and it's the other.
And it's unfortunate because. The bulk does prey
on almost new sellers because they see it as
a way to be able to scale quickly. But when it's
all junk, then you can't scale quickly. It literally
will cripple your business and stop you from
even getting off the ground and making any type
of money. So for me, I love like I had I had
a 6000 DVD pickup last month and that was that
was excellent. Like I'm fine. Like sign me up
for as many pieces of disc media and I'm full
transparency. OK, you guys you guys think when
I go on Facebook marketplace, right, that I'm
looking and I'm looking at every photo and I'm
like zooming in to see like I just need my price
to be right. And I want to pay between 10 and
15 cents a piece per DVD or CD. I don't care
what like there's no way. Like, first off, there
ain't enough photos to show, you know, five,
six thousand DVDs. Second off, I'm just like,
well, at that price point. I'm never going to
lose. And I've never lost money on any type of
bulk buy I've done. Sure, there's been times
where I've come close to breaking even, but like
I never lost my ass across the board. And I'm
just buying stuff blindly. I just see there's
6 ,000 DVDs. I do ask questions, right? Because
why the hell does somebody have 6 ,000 DVDs,
right? Like what's going on here? The last one
was like a movie store clean out that a guy did,
but he didn't sell media. So he just threw it
in the basement. The one prior to that was...
The guy bought a record store and he had a pile
of CDs. He didn't even care about the CDs. He
wanted to renovate the space into like a loft
kind of real estate kind of deal. But you ask
the questions before you buy, even in those situations,
because why does somebody have, you know, a Gaylord
of books? Why does somebody have 6 ,000 DVDs?
And you can inquire and sure, right? that person
might be lying to you. In today's world, unfortunately,
people are kind of on the scummier side, especially
in the reselling universe. So you got to understand,
okay, well, there's a chance that this might
be absolute garbage and I might have to do a
lot of work and I might have to get rid of things.
But if you can still get it at the right price,
at least you know you're not going to lose your
bank account over it. Like I'm not going to go
spend $10 ,000. I'm not even going to spend a
thousand. I guess the highest I would go is like
$2 ,000 on a bulk. If I had this crazy bulk opportunity
and I never bought anything from them and I just
showed up and was like, here, take my money and
I'll take everything. Even if I was in a situation
like that, I'm going to see what they actually
have before I hand over the money. I'm going
to get there. Hey, can I take a look at what
we got before we actually finalize the deal?
Because you just show up and you just throw your
money at them. They don't care, right? You got
to do a little bit of due diligence as best you
can because people are slime balls. But, dude,
I love bulk DVDs and CDs. Hey, that tractor trailer
pulls up, Johnny. Hey, me, Deb, and the cats,
we're going down there. We're unloading that
damn thing. And I used to scan my bulk inventory
on the sidewalk regardless of the – as long as
it wasn't raining because I didn't have a pop
-up tent. 100 degree heat sunburn out there on
the sidewalk so nobody can tell me that oh man
what am i going to do what am i going to deal
with it and then guess what i'm on the third
damn floor so everything i do find you got to
come all the way up i remember the one summer
it was so hot and i had so many cds i forget
where i got the cds from um but it was all i
remember is there was one week where you had
to wear a gilligan's island hat dude i had to
it was so hot i He was just carrying the CDs
up to the apartment in the air conditioner for
Deb to scan because it was so hot outside. But
like, that's the work that comes with it. It's
not, it's, it's like you said, right? Like nobody
puts out there like them in the Gaylord and like
their back is, you know, crushed and it turns
into like a Bengay commercial because you can't
bend for like the next three weeks of your life.
You just see like, look what I got out of the
Gaylord. And it's like. What's the accept rate?
It's like 10%, 90 % of it, you got to burn. Good
luck figuring out a way to burn it. Right. Now,
another key thing here is, I agree, you can ask
the questions, but just, we're going to use the
old Russian proverb, trust but verify. How do
you verify? Well, you buy it and you go through
it. And what are the results? And let's say the
first one's good. Let's say you buy two. Oh,
okay. Now it's time for the truckload. Don't
do that. Just buy consistently for a little while
until you fully trust them enough to then go
to the truckload route. Because they can always
send you, okay, we're going to sucker them in.
Just like we were saying, putting the good stuff
on top. The first couple pallets will give nothing
but good stuff. The next ones after that, nah.
It just gets mixed in with the good, the bad,
mostly bad and ugly. Do you think we are too...
negative about like getting scanned and with
bulk inventory no i think we want to caution
people because if we set the expectation high
of it's great and skittles and rainbows um and
it's not it'll be a bad result for both the person
doing it and anybody else they talk to about
doing bulk so as long as you go in with the mindset
of a worst case scenario and it ends up a better
case scenario I think we serve our audience telling
them this. Now, a couple things on Gaylords.
To process them, there's two methodologies. One
is a crap ton of expensive equipment. Second
is manual. Most of you, if you're going to try
this, you're going to file in the manual route.
So I'm going to give you some advice on the manual.
Do not bend over constantly to go through the
Gaylord. As you go through, it gets lower, right?
So your first inclination is to bend in there.
Your back is going to be screaming once you're
finished. Get a knife, unless you plan on reselling
the Gaylord box itself. Get a knife, cut it.
Cut it on two sides so you can get access. It'll
just naturally spill out. If you spend all day
bending, I promise you, unless you're like 20
years old, you're going to be hurting. I was
going to say that like... if i had to do i've
never personally had like an actual gate lord
right the box and the palette and everything
but i would just cut it down the side and just
kind of yeah you cut it down the side on one
side and we need to go deeper you just cut another
thing is grab a crate or something and like shuffle
it in the crate and then go to your table or
whatever you're processing please don't bend
over constantly you will you will truly hurt
yourself um and or be miserable for the next
couple days if you do it that way Also, the squatting
on the knees, that's going to hurt you too. It's
going to hurt your knees a lot, especially if
you're on the older side. I mean, you know this
if you've been doing thrifts, right? How long
can you squat doing those lower shelves? It hurts.
Get yourself some knee pads. That's better than
squatting. And you'll look silly and ridiculous,
but you'll spare your knees and your back that
way. So those are my two tips if you're going
to do the manual route. Also, pallet jack. That'll
save you a little bit of money. on fees because
if you need to tell them to move it somewhere
that's going to be additional fee for your truck
a pallet jack like a hand crank one that's going
to cost you a couple hundred bucks but it's worth
that expense now if you're like screw that i
want to buy myself a forklift well good luck
with that buddy uh same for a tipper um people
you don't know what that is it literally raises
it up and tips it down onto the table and spills
them all out Again, this is the difference between
manual and machinery. Machinery does make your
life easier, but it comes with a higher expense
and maintenance cost because those machines can
and will break. Mega sellers win in bulk because
they have the machinery, right? If you compare
me and Johnny, I was a manual guy and he has
all the fancy equipment, right? He's got the
things off with the forklift and I'm like, I'm
still trying to figure out how to even get into
my Gaylord, right? The glorified, you know, part
-time bulk sellers that win are people that...
can't spend a lot of time in their business and
they have the inventory sitting in their garage
so when they get an hour or two they can go grab
a box grab you know a bag full and scan through
it those are the part -timers that win in bulk
i mean the part -timers that are losing in bulk
is basically everybody else if you just have
stuff sitting around and you just let it sit
there and it's it's such a slippery slope and
we have so many people in the group right that
are successful with gaylords But I just think
back to what I said earlier. Like it is, like
you said, you came up with the terminology, right?
You got the terminology. Like these are unscanned,
like fresh inventory, raw inventory. These are
shelf pulls from, I don't know, hat price books.
Never been touched. Yeah. So like, that's how,
that's like, those are the people that win. They're
not, I've still yet to come across somebody that's
successful buying gay lords off Facebook marketplace
or. from uh some other reputable sources out
there in the universe it's all here's one for
you goodwill palettes right i mean you can have
pretty good results with that especially um if
it's like a goodwill bins palette like they just
put the books in this gay lord and it's just
sitting there for you to go through you walk
over to the manager or somebody and say how much
for just to buy it they tell you 40 bucks game
on they tell you 180 well screw that guy um but
here's a tip on pallets if you got truck if you
have a truck instead of more than likely it's
not going to fit in there uh with the tailgate
on you can literally take your tailgate off you're
gonna have to google how to do this on your truck
but i guarantee you the pallet will then go in
your truck because normally it has the either
the metal or the cords where it hangs the the
the tailgate But if you remove that, it'll go
in nicely. Now, if you got the hubs on the interior
that are over the wheels, it is not going to
fit. I'm sorry. But if you so happen to be in
that circumstance, you can just take your tailgate
off and it'll pop right in. And I'm telling you
this to like the 10 % of you that may have a
truck like that. So good job, 10%. I'm going
to tell this story of how you can crush your,
I guess, would it be your competition's soul.
and business with Bulk. We got a guy in the group,
Roy. He does Bulk. Roy's a good guy. And so he
goes to the Goodwill bins, right? Because you're
talking about Goodwill Gaylords. And there's
a bunch of crazy ass booksellers. If you've ever
been to the Goodwill bins for books, it's chaos,
right? So they roll out their little bin and
then they say go. And everybody just fills up
their cart and goes to the side and scans it
all. They have no, you know. They have no mannerisms.
It's just chaos. So because he's a genius, he's
a small business owner. This is just one of his
many operations that he has. He said, you people
are crazy. He went to the manager and said, hey,
can I just buy these things out? Here you go.
Right there. Yeah. That's what Johnny said. Can
I just buy these things? Yeah. So now every I
don't know the exact day, but for the sake of
this, I'm just going to say every Monday. Little
old Roy drives on down with his trailer and pickup
truck to the Goodwill bins before opening. They
open at nine. He's there at 830. He backs up
to the dock. There's a line of crazy booksellers
standing out front. He buys all the Gaylords
so they don't even make it to the floor. And
then on his way out of the parking lot, he drives
past the line with a cigar in his mouth and laughs
and waves at all the booksellers in line. I mean,
this is like the prime example of leveling up
your business. The price is right, right? The
Goodwill Gaylords, they're not expensive at all.
He's got the processes on the back end to quickly
get through these and get rid of them. I mean,
this is like the perfect example of if I ever
had a truck, my name was Roy. I smoked cigars.
That is exactly who I would want to be just because
that's it. That's business. minded thinking on
the next level now he just needs to get a driver
to go pick it up for him so roy could just continue
to buy at home or process at home making it come
to him essentially and i don't know if he smokes
cigars i just thought it'd be like a cool image
you're gonna say he smokes cigars because that
makes roy 10 times cooler if he does yeah yeah
yeah like i just see like the image of some some
dude in his truck with a cigar laughing and waving
as he's got like you know his open top uh trailer
with like 10 gay lords in it and then everybody
goes in at nine o 'clock and there's like three
books to fight over okay now i'm gonna speak
to the 90 of people that don't have a truck like
i described so for you guys how do i do it and
i know and i've seen photos even in our discord
have you guys filling up your cars to the brim
on the interior with windows rolled up leaning
to the side head out the window driving at 40
miles an hour because you can't see anything
to the left or right or behind you you could
do that Alternatively, and maybe it's more than
one carload and it's 40 minutes away, you don't
want to have to do multiple trips. There's this
place called U -Haul. They have... Nah, dude,
we're too cheap. Come on now. No, no, no. That
is worth the money. That is worth the money.
It costs... Like, I'm doing one because I'm going
out of state to do like a $3 ,000 or $4 ,000
book pickup and it would... I couldn't do a truckload
worth. So I am going to rent a trailer. It's
like a 4x8 enclosed trailer. It's costing me
$60 for three days. That includes a noon pickup
time and a noon drop -off time. It gives me an
all -day drive time, right? For $60 in an enclosed
trailer for a three -day rental? Hell yeah. Yeah,
but I ain't got a hitch, dude. I ain't got a
hitch on the Ultima. Okay, I will say that. You
will have to buy yourself a hitch. But... If
you plan on staying in the game a while, you
might consider just buying the damn hitch, Mike.
A one -time purchase. Come on. I'm broke, dude.
I sell books for a living. So if you do this
first time, you may be spending $160. But every
time after that, and it'll be cheaper if it's
just a day rental, right? It'll be like $30 a
time after that. But you can do it in whatever
Ultima. geoclass Mercedes car you got, right?
You don't have to have a big old truck. And when
you're done with it, it just goes back to good
old U -Haul. Now, if you plan on staying in the
game for a while and you're scaling and scaling
and scaling, you may want to buy a trailer like
Mr. Roy has. But again, that'd be an extra cost
onto you. But these are things to keep in mind.
Again, this is a tool. I consider it like a dolly.
Sometimes you need to have a damn dolly. Sometimes
you need to have a damn trailer. Because... going
back and forth to do big hauls i'm telling you
that sucks i'd rather just get the u -haul rental
do it once and be done uh i gotta i got one that
i want to hit on here is don't think you're going
to be the outlier right so utilize the community
we have uh regardless of your category right
whatever community youtube community social media
community if johnny is getting gay lords from
someplace and it sucks and uh I think I'm just,
well, I'm going to get them and they're going
to be better. That is not the case. And I'll
give a perfect example of somebody in the community
that saved my ass. And we had him on the podcast
many, many moons ago. John Muscarell, a side
hustle experiment. He used to do both books.
He lives 20 minutes from me. And there was a
library that reached out to me and said, hey,
our book guy isn't picking up the books after
the sale this year. Are you interested? well,
I'm thinking to myself, how many book guys are
around me, right? So I shot John a message. I'm
like, yo, dude, was this you? And he said, Mike,
do not do that. And I said, case closed, buddy.
He's like, I did it. And I literally, it was
like 99 % not worth it. And he had to just take
it all to the Goodwill outlets to get rid of
it. And he had to rent the U -Haul and everything
because it was a lot of books. It was one of
the bigger sales in the area. So if you are on
the fence or you come across one of these uh
websites or one of these uh gurus trying to push
uh buying inventory on bulk you know shoot me
a message right i i don't like publicly out these
terrible sources and some days johnny i'm like
Man, I just want to make a video and out all
the nonsense that goes on. Burn all the bridges,
Mike. Burn them all. Just be me and Johnny, right?
We don't even care. We'll be 90 years old. We'll
just be us two. No members. We burned everybody.
No, but like do your due diligence and you'd
be surprised that maybe somebody else had an
experience and all the experiences that I've
seen or heard over the years with some of these
bulk sources. I can be like now when somebody
tells me like, oh, I bought them from this company.
I'm like, oh, no. Right. Like I know other people
that have had similar experiences with these
people. So it's just ask questions. And it saved
my ass big time because I would have had to rent
a U -Haul and then I would have just basically
had to take it all to Goodwill. I basically would
have been working for free for two or three days
with the amount of books. So, I mean, it's smart
to. Not only do your due diligence with the source,
but ask around in some larger communities or
larger groups if anybody else has ever dealt
with this company or person that's selling this
basically inventory in bulk. Okay, I'm going
to talk on a couple more sources, and then I
want to talk about red flags with your current
source, at least in bulk. But auctions, people
have mixed results. In my area, they are fantastic.
In other areas, they're just literal crap. But
on auctions, here's some tips here. If you can
see it by the shelf or they're showing the whole
room and you put in a minimum bid of two bucks,
you know what you want? Well, driving out 50
minutes for a shelf or a room full of books kind
of sucks. So what I tend to do when I do the
auctions, I'll do many of those and I'll make
a whole day of it. And I'll again, I may or may
not need the U -Haul based off what I'm buying.
But that's a great way to get somebody's collection.
There's a lot of money in collections or there's
a lot of no money in collections. So you do need
some book knowledge. You're not going to be able
to scan these things in advance, more than likely.
And that just leads into networking with those
auction houses after you pick it up. I'm probably
brushing over a couple things there, but we're
short on time, so I'm going to go on to the next.
I'm too much, dude. I'm too impulsive. I'm just
raising my paddle every time, right? And then
Deb's got a paddle, and then we're raising our
paddle against each other because we just want
to win, and we wind up paying way too much money.
Okay, another tip on auctions, if you're unfamiliar
with auctions, is don't bid up front. Wait until
the last half hour. and then then put in your
bids because what happens if you put in a minimum
bid and a maximum bid it's going to go straight
to your maximum within 24 hours so you don't
raise the needle needlessly wait a minute um
i also do i prefer online i've done physical
auctions but i have to sit through so much crap
i don't care about to eventually get to the auction
i want i i don't i tend not to lean that way
because of time there are deals to be had at
physical auctions and if you're willing to You
got more time than money. I mean, more power
to you. Libraries. It's real tempting to be a
clean -out guy for a library, but as Mike mentioned,
red flag. Or they need to thin out their shelves.
Try it, but after, I'm going to say two attempts,
if it's just not worth your time, you need to
cease. dealing being a clean out guy with that
particular library um one time's okay i mean
it sucks but it happens but two times in a row
not a fan um and then the last one and people
don't think about it and as we did on the screen
share if you don't know what i'm talking about
head on over the video and rewind it or rewind
the video um is the salt or the uh Yeah, the
salvage companies. Basically, they get books.
It's the last in the line, essentially, before
they get recycled. You're going to get great
deals there, but there's going to be a lot of
crap there. But you are going to get some bangers
here and there because stuff gets missed. We
say we miss things all the time. Other scanners
miss things all the time. It ends up at this
place. And before it dies, it could be an attempt
for you to get it. However... I agree with what
the little document showed. Probably the lowest
end accept rate there, just because of what I
mentioned. It's been through so many hands before
it ended up there. That's the only reason why
it has that low accept rate. Red flags. Well,
we'll just go shot for shot here, all right?
So I might steal yours. Great for reselling.
I'm out. Ha! Dead animals in my palate. I'm out.
Not picked over. I'm out. Them changing the deal
last minute. Either they raise the price or remove
something from the deal right when you're about
to pay. Oh, man, dude, that's a good one. I've
had it happen to me. That is a good one. That
threw me off here. Let me see here. I don't know
if this is one, but I'm going to throw it out
there anyway. No, I guess it's not one. Cause
then they just, they really just want it all
gone. I don't know. You got another one. Skip
me. Skip. Raising the price too many times within
the year. This is a weird one, but I think it
might have some, I think this one might have
a little bit of solidarity behind it. Must take
everything at once. That's a good one. Cause
I mean, then you can't come back and be like,
yo, like there was a pile of dull crap in this.
They failed to deliver on time and they, well,
I'm just going to leave it there. I'll do another
one after that. Go ahead. Staying reselling supplies
in the photo of the bulk inventory. I have had
this happen. I've seen scanners. I've seen poly
mailers. I've seen basically their whole reselling
shipping setup and they're trying to spin it
as it's great for you. When you have an issue.
And you deal with customer support and they want
nothing to do with you. Business as is. Yeah,
for sure. Like if any reputable company will
fix a problem, right? Like they'll, if I, if
I was selling Gaylords and for some reason, you
know, there's a three foot rat in the bottom,
right? I'm going to fix that for Johnny, right?
Like that's my business. That's my reputation.
So if they're not willing to fix something for
you. Yeah, we're out of there for sure. There's
just. There's so many upsides, but there's so
many pitfalls. It's like it's almost like gambling.
Bulk inventory is like the gambling of reselling
because you don't know what you're going to get.
And you could have great, you know, like I had
with the DVDs. You could have great buys or you
can have it like I had to where I drove 30 minutes
and they were all outside and it was all cookbooks
that were worth absolutely nothing. But I still
have to provide the service. It's just such a
gamble. And, you know, it's fun gambling. I ain't
gonna lie, right? It's fun. You know, that's
why a lot of us got into it. Storage wars. You
open up the door. You don't know what's in there,
right? Like, hey, let's go. But it works both
ways. You can get burned. You can make a lot
of money. Any final thoughts on bulk, Johnny?
I think the one thing we didn't cover, there
are, beyond pallets, they do palletize. What
that basically means is they come in boxes, which
is a lot more easier to work with than a big
old box with everything poured in. but you're
going to have like, I don't know, 20 boxes. I
like those much more than actual Gaylord. Gaylord's
a lot of work. So that's my final thought on
podcast as a whole. My final thought for everyone.
I think Mike said it multiple times. I'm going
to reemphasize it here. Do your due diligence,
whether it's a test by asking the right questions,
trying different types of bulk to find out what
works for you. You're going to have to do it.
Keywords and due diligence. You're going to have
to do it to actually know. Because everything
we mentioned here, some of those are going to
be great in certain areas and some of them are
going to be crap. Just like I mentioned, auctions
are great in my area. They may be crap for you
in your area. That's fair. Try something else
if it isn't working. Trying to force it to work,
you're just going to lose. Yeah, and it's funny.
The pallet of CDs I bought was boxed, like you
said. And it was like the perfect size boxes
for CDs. And it was like two rows of CDs. Dude,
oh my God. I could get through like 10 pallets
of those a day. So much easier. The barcodes
were all the same way. There's two nice rows.
Oh my God. Sign me up for that bulk life. I'll
take that any day of the week. That's going to
do it for this week's episode. We'll talk to
y 'all next week. Thanks for listening to another
episode of the Resellers Mindset Podcast. Today's
full episode and all previous episodes are available
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