Ebay Cue - Strange Q & A

[ADR147]

it would make no difference - ebay in essence is a trading post - if trevor or parris were to sell their cues second hand at half the price some people who had bought them would not be happy with the deal they were offered and would ebay them instead.

it is not possible to make a system such as ebay obsolete because like all auctions it will fetch the price that it commands - the truth is that whether you like it or not an auction is the only fair way to price an item.

it should be possible however to stop people selling copies.

[Watford]

Yeah!
To be honest I'm suprised there's not already more second hand cue shops.
When I was looking for a cue I only new of Craftsman that were selling various second hand cues.

[keith auld]

You bring up some interesting points, not least of which is the quality of the cues made in Thailand and China which John freely acknowledges. Although the layman may not be able to see the difference between mass produced and hand made cues, they would certainly know the difference when picking them up. Handmade cues, by virtue of the fact they have been made using a hand plane will always have a straight taper and shouldn't have any high or low points along the shaft, whereas lathe made cues invariably are a little convex in the middle where centrifugal force would have thrown them when turning. However anyone with a computer based router operation can get around that problem and produce straight tapered cones. All cuemakers use different perameters when making their cues ( ie JP will differ to Trevor who will differ to me or Mike - the only time this will alter is if the cuemaker involved has taught someone and they in turn become master cuemakers in their own right, in those cases the student tends to build on the system he learnt and has proved successful in it's own right - as I was taught so I taught Robert Osborne - so our cues will be very similar in the final outcome) so in that regard your handmade cue is unique, and due to the inability for most of us to mass produce (most of us only have small workshops and do the cuemaking ourselves, so producing quantities is a problem) the originality, attention to detail and individual care taken in the making of the handmade cue is what people are buying when they come to us cuemakers. I don't know about the other cuemakers, but I always judge my finished cues by whether I'd like to play with each one made and whether it's a wrench to part with it. Have I made 'excalibur' this time? damn it's got to go to whoever. It seems to be a system thats worked for me over the years!

[Teresa]

Just a quick question , in all of your experiences, in general, is it better to bid for an item or buy it now? or does it depend on the items value????

It's just that i'm new to ebay and haven't had any problems yet !but my thoughts are that if it seems too good to be true it probably is!!! Or is that unfair?!

[TheStranger]

Teresa - I tend to lean towards Buy It Now, as a purchaser, because you don't run the risk of being outbid in the last 25 seconds by just a few quid.

On the other hand, when I'm the one outbidding people in the last few seconds, it's a very satisfying feeling.

I've only had a couple of issues on Ebay over the years, my most recent purchase (American pool-sized Aramith snooker balls) went well.

[Teresa]

Teresa - I tend to lean towards Buy It Now, as a purchaser, because you don't run the risk of being outbid in the last 25 seconds by just a few quid.

On the other hand, when I'm the one outbidding people in the last few seconds, it's a very satisfying feeling.

I've only had a couple of issues on Ebay over the years, my most recent purchase (American pool-sized Aramith snooker balls) went well.

Thanks for that , it was just after seeing some posts in this thread I was a bit unsure!!!!Cheers