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I am wondering: after all your expenses ( gas, shipping, labor, taxes, storage, e.t.c.) how much money do you have left over from scrapping E-Waste ?
I am asking this to figure out a general price that I could pay folks for "stuff" and still have a few $ left over.
Items would include, but not limited to:
Desktops, laptops, cell phones, smart devices, VCRs / DVD / Blue Ray, Flat screen, other general electronics, and E-Waste in general.
Thank you very much. :recycle:
Hi RLS0812,
I doubt many people, if any people, will answer this question. Part of the reason is that some of buy from a lot of folks on the forum. If you head over to the buyers' forum, you can see prices. Then, figure out where you can afford to buy the products considering everything you listed. i really wish you the best.
Ken
Not as much as I would want!Quote:
Originally Posted by RLS0812
The problem is that there is such a mix of scrappers here, ones that scrap 20 hrs - 80 hrs a week, part time full time, own space used for different uses. all affect the bottom line. Personally I get all my scrap for free and do it out of my house so my only expense is gas.
or the fact there are several of these threads, where some did answer.
The others said it well enough. May want to search out the older threads on this subject.
Sirscrapalot - Round and round an round and round and round and round we go.
For me, I'd rather make something (anything) than pay a large national corporate waste company, that would have recycled a little (very little), putting most of it in a large hole in the middle of the desert and each year charging me more. Now my waste expenses are going down, my revenue is about the same and I put one more person to work. The big plus for me, I sleep better at night, knowing I'm trying to be a solution than another problem! $$$ numbers those belong to me.
I can't (and won't) tell you an exact number but I will tell you how I figured out my buying price(s)
Strip down a few computers, weigh all of the components, and then figure out how much each component is worth. Then average it out.
So if each computer grosses (before shipping and other expenses) X, then factor in your expenses.
Let's say your expenses are Y per computer. X - Y = your net per computer, Z
Then, find out how much of a margin you are comfortable making per computer. This is something you and only you can decide on. Let's call this one A
Z (your net per computer) - A (your acceptable profit) = B, your buying price.
There, I did some algebra for you. Plug in your numbers and have fun.
Matty laid this out in the easiest but simplest way possible. It's your job as a buyer to figure out your exact overhead, (should be a part of anyone doing any kind of business), determine market value after logistics of shipping and storage and determine how much you would like to make on it. Basic finance practice will tell you a business should try to operate on 20-30% ROI (return on investment) but you can adjust this figure when considering your particular overhead costs.Quote:
Originally Posted by MattyNoNeck
Shipping is minimal, labor depends on how you value your time, and storage is in my own apartment, so free.Quote:
Originally Posted by RLS0812
As for prices, if we're talking scrap value only. Then for a desktop I would pay $5 or less, a laptop about $1, and the rest I wouldn't pay anything. Some people buy cellphones by the pound, but unless it's a huge amount it will be worth very little.
I'm sorry if this is going to seem offensive. I have seen questions like these like this on here before and it kind of ticks me off. Instead of YOU doing your own research of a certain market, you want someone to just hand you the information on a platter. Sure, most people here are willing to help out with certain questions regarding a thing or two. Consider this, I walk into john does local business and say hey can i take a look at you books so I can determine if i can not only compete with you but possibly undercut you putting you out of business. I'm sure I would receive a not so kind response.
This is the sort of thing that's taboo in business. Nobody serious about it, trying to make a living from it is going to share their expenditures report with their gross income with you. There's a good reason for that because like it or not some of us compete with each other. I will give tips to maximize because it's prudent for me and I'm trying to be helpful, what I won't do is:
I will not tell anyone I'm not in business with:
How much I make
How much material I process
Who I sell to
What refiners I am using
What I am selling to other buyers
What my shop looks like or how much I have in it
How much I spent on material
Things I will show:
Tools I use, how I use them
Identification of various things
My truck, my sorting area, my workbench
My recomendations: People, places, methods.
Let me be direct here. This is going to appear rude, what reason would I have to disclose ANY of that information to you. Would it help you? Would it hurt me? Yep, and Yep. Frankly it's hard work, it takes knowledge and involves more than driving around and picking up sheet iron, vacuum cleaners and car rims all day long. The more you learn the better it becomes. Computer recycling is difficult to be profitable on a larger scale. This is why there's less than a dozen large operations in the united states, despite 25% electronics production to waste stream going on...you can see where I am going with this.
My take: Figure it out for yourself.
Somewhere between $1 and $1,000,000 You figure it OUT!
it would appear... a consensus has been reached
annnnnnnd..... that's all
Year 2 was less then year 1 and year 3 less then year 2 and year 4 less then year 3. The reason, more competition from people who didn't do their home work. Selling prices are down, people are paying more for dead computers, because they didn't do their home work. and electronics /Computer companies are doing more with much, much, much less.
An MMLC that 2 years ago was about 1/4" x 1/8" is now nearly microscopic, the price is still the same or, but the weight is less then 1/10, new processors avg $8 per lb old ones $110, boards are 1/2 weight or less, shipping is up. You may well have missed the bus. E scrapping is not something you wake up in the morning and decide to do,
It takes knowledge to be a scrapper to just make a few $ or break even if your lucky. E scrapping is not for the novice with out a lot of study here. Most scrap is free. E scrap is usually not so unless you are prepared to lose yer A**, do your home work and pray a lot. Just my .02
My Net:
There's lots of holes in my net!
I'm afraid more and more everyday people just hop on this forum and ask "hey can I have your business model that you've spent your time, blood sweat and tears on so I can become your competitor?"
Yeah, that is pretty funny. And tons of people that are just too lazy to take a MB, throw it on a scale, look at what someone is paying, and figure out what its worth. While not rocket science, some people act like it is instead of putting out a little effort.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mmarro89
I think E-scrap alone for the small timer is not going to cut it.........Evolve, Adapt, OvercomeQuote:
Originally Posted by olddude
I have volunteered my process on another thread to make an example of how i don't have anything into the parts i hoard, just the other day. So it just goes to show, that people asking for that quick answer, not only don't have the willingness to figure it out on their own, but they don't read the $hit that's already been said here. If anyone really wanted to formulate some numbers, all they have to do is put the pieces together from what I have said personally, and what others have said, and then take a quick peek at some of the buyers prices... weight up your own parts... and bang... you have the answer to why that chicken crossed the road.
I think the OP really wants to hear that we all buy computers for ten bucks each, make twenty five and deal in tonnage...
I'm a nice guy but I'm also pretty ruthless. I'm out to provide excellent customer service and grind my freeloading competitors right into the ground. I'm not a fan of people who show up, pay 6 bucks a computer for a bunch of p4 dells then complain to me (locally I might add, because that's often how this happens) that my prices aren't high enough for them. Well, let me help you, your expectations and reality missed each other by miles sir. I will repeat over and over again, this is not an industry to get into if your not planning to take a plunge into it as your sole efforts, what it really is for most of my individual customers is a side business where they save material from targets of oppurtunity, and that I can appreciate very much. It shows hard work and being out there to get what they can and not spend too much getting it.
I'm honestly tired of the people who think there's several grams of gold in every tower. Ever since the boom, less informed shops and individuals look at me like I should be offering 40 bucks a tower. Most common phrasing "Ohh no way I can let it go for that, there's alot of gold in there." Same people call me back months later long after I've crossed them off the solicit list and ask if I'd still buy. Answer is yes, but not at my initial offer, because now I have to make an out of the way trip when it could have been handled on the spot.
Difficulties in business gentlemen. You will forever be dealing with people who think they are the leprechaun sitting on a literal pot of gold.
If it was easy everyone would do it.........Would love to pick up said material at $10 each and drive it across town and get $25 each........It has happened but those days are getting few and far between as everyone is a little more educated on ewaste than perhaps they once were...........Quote:
Originally Posted by armygreywolf
I made alot more last year than this year..Not to be a wet blanket but now is not the time to put out a shingle in my opinion, most metals including escrap are way down and unless you have access to alot of material I'd be more inclined to get a part time job at the gas station, your garage won't be full of scrap as you wait for enough to ship or the price to bounce back (probably not happening anytime soon) and your check will not be dependent on the flux of the markets. This is a tough business and unless you are VERY proactive your sources will dry up leaving you in a limbo without enough to ship and too much to throw away.. Again if I had to start now I wouldn't even bother. JM $.02
Well said wolf.
I feel bad at times for my silence and lack of commenting as I read though many posts on here however... I spend much of my time on here doing just that READING...researching, and then DOING! That as was mentioned earlier is the best way to develop and attack your OWN business plan and decide what works and doesnt as well as what your real NET is...(which I too concur is basically no ones business but my own) I seldom buy escrap though I do pick up a ton curbside...I would really never even consider paying for stereo receivers especially ones that had sat out in the rain for months (they were in the back yard of a property that i was cleaning out) much to my surprise the 4 large transformers inside weighed in at a total of 27 pounds....so yeah I went on a small rant but ya just dont really know til you get involved and do some work!
The first and best advice I received on this forum was to read old threads. I constantly still do! When I welcome a new member I encourage them to do the same. And I am not the only one to advise them to do so. But some just don't get it,or they are just lazy. Either way its their loss. It would have taken me years to learn the information that I learned in those first few months of researching old threads. And I am still learning! Lazy people rarely succeed in a business like this, if ever.
Generally no, but everything depends on intake volume. I don't see laziness or lack of research, but rather curiosity. It's curiosity that starts threads like this - no matter what it's intent is. I'm with everyone else though, I won't tell anyone how I do my business because it's no one's business(not even the mayor's aid that came to the house wanting to know what my process is) no matter how often or how many ways you ask it. We all live by a code and that code protects us because this isn't K-Mart or the local mom and pop shop where you can walk in and ask for that information freely because it's publicly accessible.Quote:
Originally Posted by mikeinreco
I think I get what you are proposing to do. If I have guessed correctly, you want to give a little something to people for them giving something to you worth value, that you can make money on.Quote:
Originally Posted by RLS0812
If this is the case, allow me to alleviate the guilt you might be experiencing.
People who are throwing out electronics, almost always are doing so because they are old, they have purchased NEW items to replace them, and they do not want to incur the penalty or cost of taking it to the dump and then paying possible hazardous waste prices to dispose of it. Instead, they can kick it to the curb, and some industrious hard working person will come by and pick it up. This is your payment for removing items from their living space, they have no time to properly dispose of themselves.
But if that doesn't convince you that you have every right to make money off of other people free junk, let me attempt once again to give you a good reason NOT to pay for e-waste whenever you can get away with it. If you were purchasing cell phones for example, how much would you be willing to pay, per phone, and feel you treated your customer right? .50 cents? A dollar? 5? If you answered 5, you are paying 4 dollars in most cases, more than what the phone is actually worth in precious metals. .50 cents and you are paying right around half of it's value, which cuts into your gross profit 50%.
I think it's an amazing service that scrappers are providing, without being directed to do so. Industrious people who are hard working, who go out of their way to remove those items people do not care to have anymore, who then break them down into smaller component parts to be sold through the right recycle streams so that they can then be re-used.
I was reading recently that close to 50% of all silver used in industry now, comes from recycling. That is all of you, can you imagine if we were only able to provide half of what industry really needed? Can you imagine what the prices for those things that use silver, specially electronics might be in that case? It would totally change the entire scope of industry.
You provide an invaluable service already, I would thankfully accept anything, anyone is willing to give you for free, and call it even. In many places, people still pay companies to take e-waste away. Many corporations still do.
Scott
There are already threads on this. Use your curiosity and do some research.Quote:
Originally Posted by logansryche
As matty said do the math. I don't buy electronics because I don't have storage to put large amounts, although I do have electronics that I've found or been given. My biggest load I got some laptops and laptop docks. A tub of them and it earned me around $50 but I have no escrap buyers besides a low paying yard
You seem to be a bit confused, I was replying to the OP(RLS0812) with my thoughts on the matter.Quote:
Originally Posted by junkfreak
Buyer's section!Quote:
Originally Posted by DevinThaScrapper
I can't really answer that question with a dollar figure- I refurbish some systems, so I make more on some machines than others. A Pentium Pro is worth more than a Pentium 4.
E-Waste isn't a commodity as a whole. RAM and HDD boards, though, are.
HAHa! Junkfreak really does read the old threads. I only know cause when JF thanks my posts I can see their dates, an some are from back when I joined! I imagine members who've been here awhile see the same thing. I like getting thanks on posts but it's always sweeter when you see their coming from older posts but newer members. Shows their going back an reading the archives like we all harp on.Quote:
Originally Posted by junkfreak
I know I did when I first joined. I must've spent a month or two reading before doing my intro. Then another month or two before I started posting more. I also apply to the method of read, an do. Sure I could sit around an wait for answers but usually my curiosity gets the best of me an it gets broken down or at lest open so I can see the innards for my own future reference.
I'm one of the few who does ewaste an doesn't really care about reselling stuff. Do I resell? Of course. I won't lie tho, I don't all the time. I have a selling background. There's a reason I got tired of it an decided to go off an do something else.
An I'm sure I've said it before in posts like this. Unless your my accountant, banker/loan officer, investor, or a possible buyer of my business...all you/anyone needs to know is I do just fine with my income. I'm not rich nor claim to be. I do well enough that I'm happy an so is my wife. So therefore..I will not discuss my finances on a forum open to the entire public. Especially when I know competition from my area or nearby is on here. Talk about making yourself a target..haha! No thanks.
Paranoid? Perhaps. In this day and age I trust nobody when it comes to my finances or banking.
Sirscrapalot - First rule of Business - DTA = Don't Trust Anyone.