Is there any need for multiple listings to show?

Graham

I understand the reason for having the same item for sale at different prices, (within reason) however surely the only listing someone would be interested in buying would be the least expensive, so why not “hide” the others until the least expensive has sold?

The exception being bulk and single.

It would reduce the clutter.

Calibrick

@graham, do you mean unique to a seller's shop or in the catalog "buy" lists?

leopard37

I believe this comes from adding inventory in bl with a part out and not combining lots. Some sellers prefer to annoy their customers by not having all their inventory under one listing.

I would think that it would reduce sales as well because if you were looking for a high quantity you would not choose that store.

Tyson

Graham

@calibrick
An example “item” listed by seller as a quantity of 50 @ $0.12 each
Same “item” listed by same seller as a quantity of 50 @ $0.19 each

They have a total quantity listed of 100 in 2 lots, but nobody in their right mind would buy the more expensive rather than the least expensive!
UNLESS one lot is bulk ie you have to buy all 50 to get the lower price.

So why not “hide” the duplicate lot that costs more until the less expensive is gone?

I understand the why.
I have some lots going OOP, therefore I wish to increase the price for future sales, however I see no reason to show the higher price lot?

@leopard37 agreed, in the example if someone wanted in excess of 50 of that part, that store would not show as an option. Also perhaps it would persuade folks to not make multiple listings unnecessarily.

Probably a pipe dream, but seems reasonable to me...

tons_of_bricks

It could probably be someone parting out like leopard37 said and didn't combine lots. When I first started selling on bl, I had bought several new sets to part out. I listed them in three different batches over the course of a couple months and each time I accidentally wrote a slightly different description for the pieces. Since the descriptions were different, bricklink didn't combine the lots and I ended with 3 listings for several pieces. So it wasn't intentional that I had multiple listings for the same piece, it happened by accident.

So that could be the problem with whatever store you noticed it on.

vegitt

Is one lot New and the other Used?

Pretty_Pieces

My store is in the middle of transitioning from category/name based storage to numbered location based storage. Since we're doing it gradually for now, we sometimes have a new lot that goes in the numbered system, but don't want to go dig out the ones in the category/name system to consolidate them. We'll drop the price on the existing batch slightly, to encourage people to buy out the older lot and save us having to move and consolidate. They can see the newer lot too, so maybe they buy all 10 of the older stock at the lower price and add a few more from the new lot if they need more.

Pretty_Pieces

To clarify, they are listed as separate lots, because they are in 2 places in the store. Yes, it would be faster picking to have them consolidated, but it would take significant time to do the full store consolidation.

leopard37

@Pretty_Pieces Just an option you could list both locations in your personal remarks and still have one lot. I have a lot of this going on with certain parts with a large quantity. Some in my drawers for a small quantity order and some in my bins for the bulk of the quantity. Also some pieces across multiple drawers.

Tyson.

Calibrick

I agree with @leopard37, I have a single lot spread between numerous bins (as they came in at diff times/costs to me) and use the personal notes to track the locations. Unless one is new and one is used, it's really just a lack of the seller consolidating the listings on their end.

I researched this when I first opened, because it's certainly easier to list new items of an existing lot separate - but it burns you in the catalog "buy" listings, as if someone is looking for large quantity, your listing won't show up that way.

So back to @graham's original point - so long as one isn't new and one isn't used, I agree with his thought to reduce the clutter (it would even help sellers). But I don't think you can force this on sellers either. But maybe you can drive positive behaviors (consolidation) with improved ways to append and consolidate new quantities in diff bins/costs to existing lot IDs? Then the problem fixes itself?

I think if you use Bricksync, it's reasonably easy once you know how. For folks like me on BO only, I tend to do it manually (which isn't the easiest way, I'm sure) as I haven't figured out how to concatenate notes fields and quantities on here while actually overwriting the mycost field (as that is weighted averaging with my chosen tax method for calculating cost). Sure, I can shut down the store, download the current inventory, do all the merges in Excel, etc., with the concatenate formula, but that sucks too I've learned. :-)

I guess my end point is that if it's easier and more value-added to consolidate lots, more people (or even most) will do it, thus also eliminating the problem. :-)