Rakuten has not found a buyer and will close permanently at the end of the year
I was making about 1 book sale per month there, so it won’t change anything for me, but I’m thinking of all the employees who will have to look elsewhere.
They are indeed proof that nothing is guaranteed in this sales platform market. What a waste, though, when you consider that the only reasons cited are competition. We should also ask ourselves why customers preferred to turn to this competition.
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I used to buy used cultural products on Rakuten fairly often, because it was fairly easy to find references there.
Since you sell books, what platform would you recommend for buying them?
The few sales I’ve had in three months are from the accounts of two resellers, who find the customer on Amazon at prohibitive prices and then try to find the item on Rakuten. One of them is actually doing his shopping on Vinted, and the other, after years, has finally opened an account.
There are comparison sites for platforms, I would start there. Their only limitation is that they don’t scan leboncoin or vinted.
Hello Frenchysacha - I don’t really have any recommendations to make. Most other platforms sell books with barcodes, so if you’re looking for older things or more « niche » titles, I can hardly see anything other than eBay.
Completely agree; PriceMinister worked well and was really top-notch. Rakuten has degraded, and on top of that, they are downright thieves. I no longer go on the platform even though I used to like going there. So too bad for them, and in the end, they ruined a company that worked very well and had a select clientele. A shame for them and the employees!
It sold well, quickly and at good prices, no fuss, and on top of that, ads were super easy to make since you just had to click a button on the product sheet, set your price, and then everything else was optional to add. Personally, I didn’t even bother writing descriptions or taking photos, and it was enough.
Plus, it was a time when there was a real trio (Rakuten, eBay, and LBC) that competed and complemented each other. So when we disliked one of the platforms, we could easily and risk-free switch to another, unlike today where one is indispensable and the others can only provide a bonus. It was definitely much easier 10 years ago.
And yes, « thieves » is exactly what I was thinking of as the reasons. The day they drastically increased the fees, they lost my personal account, and the day they sent me a bill for €12 for a cancelled sale (because it had been sold on eBay a few minutes before), they lost my professional account.
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ohhh yes 
Same here, I closed my account immediately when they considerably increased their « commission »… it was unplayable for me, in terms of margin. Especially since it wasn’t a huge % of sales with them.
yes they were already starting to decline and they made the worst possible decision: increase the commission to compensate for the drop in activity, or how to accelerate the second point. Besides, I now call that « doing a Rakuten. »
Especially when you look in the mirror at eBay, which is pretty much the closest platform to Rakuten, and they managed to stay the course and didn’t fall into this trap, and after a few years of lying low, they started a recovery. Their mistake was understanding the rise of mobile phones very late (that’s corrected) and maintaining a rather complex platform to truly adapt to the general public (there’s still a lot of effort to be made there).
Another mistake that Rakuten and eBay share is that the offer is more complex and less readable than Vinted. Vinted’s commission is low but almost mandatory with no possibility of escaping it. Whereas eBay constantly offers promotions to activate on commissions and Rakuten bombarded users with discount vouchers and cashback to make great savings. But consequently, it’s less clear, whereas eBay, if you’re clever, it’s possible for an individual to get things cheaper than Vinted, especially for small shops. I call that « doing a Géant Casino » (who were specialists in giving themselves an ultra-expensive image when there were multiple ways to make prices plummet; at one time I heavily supplied my shop thanks to them).
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Me too. Rakuten was starting to cost me more money than it was bringing me in.
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Absolutely, there was real momentum. I stopped doing sales a long time ago, and purchases… well, I’ve reduced those significantly a long time ago too. Between individuals overpricing things and completely overestimated shipping costs regardless of the package weight… Anyway, it surprises me that they lasted so long.
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I still bought there but almost only from big professional shops. It was possible to optimize quite a bit with discount codes plus cashback. And the big brands present on Rakuten, like Boulanger for example, kept the same prices as in their physical stores. Especially since I always have Club R points to spend as it’s always activated.
But as I said above, it’s a system that allows for good savings but you have to look into it to really understand how to optimize, hence the reluctant general public.
« « It was still much easier 10 years ago. » »
I don’t quite agree, because we didn’t have such efficient tracking with prepaid labels. You had to buy your own shipping, and upon arrival, if there was a dispute for one reason or another: not received, arrived late, etc., you lost everything.
I had the case of a large lot of English magazines shipped to Italy. Tracking to Italy barely existed, so the buyer had no trouble claiming they hadn’t received anything. I didn’t get the package back, so it did land somewhere. This buyer specializes in reselling these magazines, which they offer for 20/30 or even up to 50 euros each for some.
I’m not sure they were dishonest, but I blocked them. Too strange.
I was talking about selling. Otherwise, I have always known prepaid labels on Rakuten from memory. It’s the seller who chooses to let Rakuten manage it or to do it themselves.
On eBay yes, but there is still a shipping platform, and managing it yourself also has advantages, like being able to configure insurance.
great for disputes… they never want to hear anything, even though the mistakes are on their side
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Email today formally announcing end of sales/purchases on September 30, and until November 10 to retrieve funds or data history.
hello - I’m reading on Reddit that a number of Rakuten sellers are going to move to eBay, so there will be competition. One seller alone is talking about 23,000 items, so I, who just don’t want to send my library to the dump, will have a hard time selling my titles. Don’t talk to me about bookcrossing boxes. They are overflowing. The « Ressourcerie » (second-hand shop)? They already have too much. And yes, reading is an activity of the past.
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But you will also have the return of customers, of which I was one. This will give eBay energy and create emulation. Competition is sometimes beneficial in this context. More visibility, more customers. Even if prices drop a bit. More sales. In my opinion