Friends of the Library Ideas Series, Selling on eBay Part 1

Library work is great when you can sit in the evening in the middle of 30 totally engaged community members with a glass of wine in one hand and a piece of Lavosh bread with brie in the other. (Well, wineglass of orange juice, but the community members had red or white ).

It started with a library member who was decluttering her house and asked us to provide a session on eBay. I spoke to Accredited eBay Trainer – and former librarian – Julie Martin who had done some sessions for University of Western Australia Extension. We decided that she would offer a two hour introductory session about eBay and then follow it by a four hour workshop over two weeks all about selling on eBay.

You know when you take a punt and it turns out much better than you expected? Julie has been like that – full of richly detailed and fascinating stories all about eBay. The friend who sold ticket stubs to a 1966 Beatles Concert in Adelaide for $280, the boy who advertised his “max wicked sick BMX” one that “did boom gnarly stunt tricks & girl got pregnant just watching” , the husband who bought a gift for his wife – only to discover that she was actually the seller….

Our Friends of the Library have been sponsoring the sessions each Thursday night in May. Last week, Julie did a session called “Fun Family Fotos” where she showed people how to find out who was in family pictures and how to preserve and store the pictures. We were able to advertise our newly digitised Community History collection as part of the session. We have branded the sessions as the “Ideas Series” and at each session given out forms to participants, asking them what other speakers and workshops they would like in the new building and whether they would like to join the Friends of the Library. I’m really excited about running a regular “Ideas Series” after we move in August – especially if we get numbers as large as this time – 50 people on the waiting list…

I tweeted the session and fed it into a CoverItLive window so that I can embed it on the library blog tomorrow. I’ve used eBay as a buyer several times, but I found I learned an incredible amount in Julie’s session tonight. Here’s my notes:

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