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The opposite of EBay

July 20th, 2004 | Misc.

I got this idea while eating yesterday evening. I’m looking quite hard on EBay at present for certain items, but often they’re not coming up. Are there any services out there that offer the opposite of EBay - that is, I can post what I want and have people offer it to me, competing against each other to sell the item? Like “eLance”:http://www.elance.com but for consumer goods.

13 comments ↓

#1 Ross Parker on 02.10.05 at 5:26 pm

I was wondering the same thing, typed it into Google and came up with your site. Shall we build one?

#2 neil vening on 01.21.06 at 7:51 pm

I did the same thing! Lets make one email me!

#3 Tim Cinel on 08.02.06 at 12:06 pm

Yeah I thought of this too… Have you made it? If not I’m going to :D

#4 Peter Bowyer on 08.02.06 at 8:32 pm

No I haven’t - I realised that unlike eBay there’s no easy way to track whether the purchase is made or not, for final billing, as I think direct communication between the ‘wanter’ and the suppliers would be necessary.

Looks like there’s a group of us who all want this - shall we work together to solve these problems and get it going?

#5 Tim Cinel on 08.03.06 at 5:47 am

Hell yes - I think the idea has potential and is an interesting new approach (having sellers literally persue buyers)
Biggest hurdle: legal… if we can find a way to diffuse liablity but still seem reliable, then we have a solid concept :)

Please contact me by email: sickanimations at gmail dot com.

Thanks.

#6 Lynn on 08.07.06 at 10:42 pm

Great minds think alike…but is that all that we’re going to do? Let’s do it.

#7 hush on 09.27.07 at 5:19 pm

Same thought brought me to this page too.
I have the skills and a little bit of resources too.
Interested?

#8 neil vening on 12.22.07 at 3:20 pm

This sounds good guys, even if its just an experiment, we need to try and develop the concept.

Im into web dev, email me nvening at gmail dot com

#9 JRUG on 03.18.08 at 6:55 am

Just DO it…no talk all walk that’s the only way businesses prosper.

#10 swami srinivasan on 12.27.08 at 7:28 pm

Hi Peter,
Do you know if anyone worked on this idea to develop it further? I was thinking of a variant of this idea, and via google was linked to your weblog.
Swami from CA

#11 ndale on 02.16.09 at 6:21 pm

Did this materialize?

#12 Ross Parker on 01.10.10 at 10:09 am

1. I don’t agree that there are legal issues here. Also, I think that the direct contact point can be overcome (ratedpeople.com have overcome it).

A possible model may be to use auomated algorithms (or cheap labour) to match requirements to wants, then to get the referral cashback from merchants. I know that HotUKDeals makes a truck of money in this way.

#13 antiPit on 01.19.10 at 7:43 am

I think that eBay itself has already implemented this )) They have ‘want it’ section

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