You can make a very profitable business out of selling recycled furniture if you know which pitfalls to avoid and we here at Kalusto have listed below some of the more common mistakes people make when trying to sell on recycled furniture.

Simple things to avoid before we start, are to begin your recycling with a quality piece of furniture or a piece that is made from higher grade wood. It’s not worth the effort to try and recycle a piece of furniture that is made from cheaper woods such as plywood. Also, if you do not have the right tools to use or paints or varnishes it is best to avoid a piece of furniture that will require a lot of time to repair.

Let us begin with the most common mistakes that you can avoid when trying to sell your upcycled furniture

It’s All About Staging Your Furniture

When you’ve finished upcycling your piece of furniture and now are at the stage where you want to sell it on to prospective buyers a simple photograph is not really going to help you to sell it. Choosing the right environment, props and even a backdrop are very important. A lighter coloured or white wall as an example are a better backdrop to use than a darker shaded wall. You can use props such as vases, flowers, books any object that compliments the piece of furniture you wish to sell. But never use anything when staging that may distract the viewer from the furniture. It’s also a very handy way of giving ideas to potential buyers of how they can use the furniture in their home!

Say Cheese, The Photograph Matters!

When it comes to taking the picture of your upcycled piece of furniture always make sure you take a good picture as a bad picture isn’t going to help you sell the item all. An out of focus picture, not fitting in the whole piece of furniture, bad lighting, a blurred photo, shadows or where you’re taking the photo is too bright can all have a negative effect when trying to sell your furniture. So always choose somewhere with good natural light or if you can use a lamp to help if you can’t find anywhere with enough natural light. Use a tripod as if you have a shaky hand that can produce a blurred photograph. Always take your photo either straight on or slightly to the side but always remain at eye level with the piece of furniture you are photographing or at the centre and do not have the camera pointing up or down! And once you have taken the picture if you have any editing software at hand you can touch up the picture you have taken.

Don’t Over Customise Your Piece of Furniture!

A mistake that many people make when it comes to upcycling furniture is they go over the top and more elaborate than they should. Remember especially when painting old furniture to resell that going a bit too far when painting it or adding customised elements to the piece can alienate most potential buyers! A bright pink freshly painted upcycled piece of furniture may not be to everyone’s taste, so think carefully before you begin the upcycling process as to how you want the piece to turn out and if by adding certain colours or enhancements you are not aiming for just a niche market. Have a look at the marketplace and get an idea of what pieces sell well and take inspiration from those.

Don’t Just Sell Your Item in Just One Marketplace

A mistake that many upcycled furniture sellers make is by just selling their items in the one place, as an example eBay. By doing this you are potentially losing out on a wider range of potential customers. To find that perfect buyer or people interested in your furniture you need to spread your net wide and not just sell in the one place.

The Advert

When you come to posting your item for sale the description of the piece you are selling is vital. Check your spelling, make sure you are using keywords to describe the furniture, the history should be included as well (how old the item is) and even some details on the restoration process. Give suggestions in the advert as to how best any potential buyer can utilise the item and even suggest other users other than what the item is best for. Include any dimensions like height, width and depth.

The Price

When it comes to pricing your upcycled item you of course want to make a profit on the amount you originally paid for it and to cover all the costs you may of incurred when restoring it. A good thing to do is to scour the marketplace for similar items and see what prices they are charging, as this will give you a rough idea of how much you should price your item at. Don’t be afraid to go that be lower than your competitors.

The flipside of pricing is that if you price your item too low this could cut into any profit you make as well. The pitfall here is that if your items are selling well at a lower price, you can’t then turn round and start charging more for the item. So, check your pricing carefully not too high to alienate buyers of too low to not be able to revaluate your pricing!

The Payment

Don’t just go for cash in hand always offer alternative ways of paying for your upcycled furniture such as card payment, PayPal or apple pay. This will then not discourage card only buyers and all payment bases are then covered.

So, in short upcycled furniture does sell just as long as you follow the steps we have listed.

We here at Kalusto, have a variety of upcycled furniture for sale but if that’s not what you’re after we have more furniture to choose from here and you can grab yourself a bargain. Stylish, practical, Kalusto!