Tips for Selling Tableware on eBay with The Queen of Auctions

‘Portmeirion and Karma’

by Lynn Dralle, The Queen of Auctions

So there we were on a cold and overcast day in Bellingham hitting garage sales. (Something new and unusual, let the violins play on) it is either cold & rainy (B’ham) or 110 degrees (Palm Desert)…not sure which is worse.  It was windy and miserable but we forged on as all true eBay addicts do.

We stopped by an upper-end sale on the south side of Bellingham. They had nine Portmeirion canisters for sale. As I mentioned earlier they were priced way too high. The prices ranged from $4 to $12 each. I said to the couple running the sale, “I love these pieces, but would you take any less if I bought them all?” Notice how I didn’t say anything rude like, “OMG these are so overpriced. Are you crazy?” That would NEVER have worked.

Here is a photo of those beautiful Portmeirion canisters on my mom’s beach house deck.

This is how the whole karma thing begins to fit into the picture. “You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar,” as Cheryl Leaf always said.

The man holding the sale added up all the prices and came up with $69.00, he talked to his wife and they agreed on $45.00. That was an average of $5.00 each. I could handle that. I paid and loaded the Portmeirion into the minivan.

As we were leaving the sale, I whipped out my iPhone to see what was going on with eBay. Karma again for sure.  I couldn’t believe it but I had a question from a lady who wanted to buy five pieces of Portmeirion that I had for sale in my eBay store. She was asking about combined shipping to Texas. I quickly quoted her $13.95 for combined s/h/I and within minutes she had purchased $52.00 worth of my Portmeirion.

Here is one of the bowls she bought to sell on eBay .

How strange was all of that? My $45.00 investment was more than covered by selling $52.00 worth of older Portmeirion out of my eBay store. I tell you, life works in strange, yet wonderful ways.

I have all nine canisters now listed on eBay. Two of the auctions I started at $9.99 each and seven I started at $24.99. That will be at least $195.00 or a $150.00 profit on the low end. I did find out from my research that these are not called canisters but rather storage jars.

Here is one of my eBay listings.

Let’s take a look at why I love Portmeirion china. If you haven’t figured it out yet, I really love any type of quality dinnerware. I just love dishes! Portmeirion was the manufacturer that we chose for our wedding china. The pattern we picked was Welsh Dresser and about six months ago, I decided to sell it on eBay. The colors just didn’t match my décor anymore. It sold very well.

Here is the dinner plate from the Welsh Dresser Pattern.

I sold all eight that I owned on eBay for $29.99 each. They listed for $39.99 each on a popular used dinnerware web site. Here is what the Portmeirion Welsh Dresser signature looks like. You can see “Welsh Dresser” written very clearly.

But keep in mind that one of the best selling china patterns of all times is Botanic Garden (not Welsh Dresser) by Portmeirion.

Botanic Garden by Portmeirion began being manufactured in 1972 and is still a current pattern!! 38 years and counting! This one is a classic. I always snap this up when I see it and you see it a lot.

It has various plants and insects with a green laurel garland trim. There were many different styles issued in this pattern so there are 1,000s of permutations. For example, there are 38 different dinner plates.

Dinner plates range from $21.99 to $49.99 on a popular used china website. Here is what a Botanic Garden Portmeirion signature looks like.

Here is a large vegetable serving bowl. I paid $10.00 for and it sold for $84.00 on eBay in April of 2004. I love Botanic Garden!

Here is the description from my auction:

Neat Portmeirion Large Serving Bowl is marked “1972 The Botanic Garden c 1818.” It is 11 1/4” by 5 1/4”. Susan Williams-Ellis, Made in England. In the center are blue passion flowers and butterflies. Around the sides are trailing bindweed, spring gentian, meadow saffron, daisy, ivy leaves, and cyclamen—NICE.

Susan Williams-Ellis founded Portmeirion as a tableware company in the 1960s. She had been creating pottery works for her father’s gift shop at the Portmeirion Village in North Wales for years when she and her husband Euan decided to buy two pottery companies in order to expand their product lines.

The company started out slowly, but in the 1970s Susan happend to come across a nineteenth-century book of prints, some of which she adapted into the Botanic Garden line of tableware. Because they were pre-1921 copyright, they were in the public domain and available for her to use.

Hot tip. If you price Portmeirion’s Botanic Garden correctly it has a great sell-through rate at auction. Not all dinnerware does sell well at auction, so always buy the Botanic Garden pattern when you see it.

For more information on Susan Williams-Ellis and her company, please check out the official website here. She was a darling lady and unfortunately passed away in 2007. From her photos and the twinkle in her eye, she reminds me of my grandmother. Susan was born in 1918 and my grandmother in 1912. They were from the same generation when women were not supposed to run companies. I love reading about successful women like this!

Check out the history of Portmeirion here. Botanic Garden has become one of the world’s best selling tableware patterns and still accounts for half of Portmeirion’s sales. Remember that pattern name, memorize the company signature and watch for it on dinnerware. I hope your karma is as good as mine has been lately!