Barcode Booty: How I Found and Sold $2 Million of 'junk' on EBay and Amazon, And You Can, Too, Using Your Phone [Paperback]

Barcode Booty is, I believe, the fourth book Mr. Weber has written and self-published on the subject of reselling on the Internet. It would be interesting to know why Mr. Weber does not publish through an established Publishing house, since the quality of his material, and the interest it would find is certainly high.

The book passes my first test of a superior volume. I found something interesting and useful within the first five minutes of reading. If this doesn't happen, whether its cooking or theology or hiking or computer engineering, I immediately assume 4 stars or less. The easter egg in this book is when Mr. Weber describing finding a toy at T. J. Maxx for $30, which he sold on Amazon for $280. The way he was able to accomplish this discovery, with a cellular phone camera with barcode reader and pricing applications, is the primary subject of this book. Otherwise, the book essentially follows the pattern of his earlier works. Thus, if you don't have his earlier books, this rates five stars. If you do, and you are familiar with the barcode reading abilities of cell phones, maybe three stars. I split the difference.

There are two kinds of people who may be interested in this book. The first is people who wish to imitate Mr. Weber's self-made career. The second are those who may wish to avoid the first kind of people, and find where this stuff can be bought cheap.

Since the Amazon page contains lots of detail, and since there are many reviews, I will stop there and end by repeating that Mr. Weber's task is not "easy". It requires a lot of hard work, but you have the advantage of working for yourself, and a reasonable certainty of good rewards for good effort. However, it does require some basic computer talent and a place to store inventory, at least some inventory.

Steve Weber knocks another one out of the park with the latest addition to his online bookselling series. This time Steve educates his readers about the benefits of product diversification. While everyone else is worried about eBooks and how they will affect Amazon booksellers, Steve is busy reselling children's toys, power tools, grocery items, and the like. All the while using the exact same skills he developed scouting for books. And by the way, he still sells lots of books too.

I mean this guy is cutting edge! He tells you what equipment to buy, what software to use, and how to spot bargains waiting to be bought and resold from just about any retailer you care to mention. He literally explains how you can use your smart phone as a "treasure detector."

For example, he regales the reader with stories of how some of his students patrol stores like TJ Maxx, Big Lots, HomeGoods, Marshalls, and Burlington Coat Factory; picking up bargains from $0.25 - $0.50 on the dollar and reselling them on Amazon at full retail. It's safe to say that Barcode Body is the ultimate arbitrage tool for online sellers of all kinds.

Just because a manufacturer discontinues a brand or model doesn't mean it can't be sold profitably online. Manufacturing companies closeout merchandise all the time. That can spell big bucks for you if you know what to look for. Weber shows you how.

This compact 156 page book packs quite a wallop. If you're looking for a part-time or full-time endeavor, or if you want to branch out into new territory in your bookselling business, then this is one book you can't afford to pass up.

I liked this book. The author has been writing about what he does to make a living since 2005 when he released The Home-Based Bookstore: Start Your Own Business Selling Used Books on Amazon, eBay or Your Own Web Site. I never read that book, but I am aware of it. In 2007 he released two books on how to market and sell online effectively. These were Plug Your Book! Online Book Marketing for Authors, Book Publicity through Social Networking and Plug Your Business! Marketing on MySpace, YouTube, blogs and podcasts and other Web 2.0 social networks. Then in 2008 he pumped out two more books on using the two huge "garage sale" Web sites online to sell your wares. See Sell on Amazon: A Guide to Amazon's Marketplace, Seller Central, and Fulfillment by Amazon Programs and eBay 101: Selling on eBay For Part-time or Full-time Income, Beginner to PowerSeller in 90 Days. I've read these four last mentioned books. I think I have posted reviews for most of them at Amazon, too.

I used to be a SCORE dot org volunteer counselor/consultant. Online marketing, eBay, and sometimes Amazon, were hot topics on many evening counseling sessions I attended. I mentioned Weber's books often. None of my "clients" complained about the books that I had recommended they read. But I NEVER was too encouraging about pursuing an online retail shop that sold other peoples' junk. That's basically what Weber has done for the past several years and written about. Finding the inventory to sell is a serious hassle, and packaging it so the mailing services can deliver it is yet another hassle. Quite frankly, you would not catch me doing it. It's just too labor intensive without a sufficient payoff to justify the time spent. The author says over 10 years he has had gross sales of $2 million. Divide that figure by 10, substract the applicable cost of goods sold, subtract opportunity cost of lost wage income, and subtract other operating costs, and I bet Weber has not made out all that well. In fact, he's probably in the hole.

So what is the instant book being reviewed about and why did I like it? I liked it because the author has written a book that kind of addresses the two big problems I mention herein above: (1) help with finding inventory to sell, and (2) order fulfillment. The old way of finding inventory to sell relied a lot of the author having a database of information in his head that sometimes helped him and sometimes didn't. Now he advocates doing his searches with an Internet connection in his hand and doing price searches using it. Isn't it amazing how we can walk around anywhere with a wireless Internet connection in our hand today?

The old way of doing order fulfillment was to have a bunch of cardboard boxes and shipping tape in the family garage and spend lots of time packing the sold inventory and then taking trips to the post office. Bummer. I hope you didn't pay for a college education to do that! Anyway, the author has gotten smart and outsourced that function today. He writes about what he does in this book. It's really pretty simple - call in Amazon to save the day.

While this book might at first glance seem like a rehash of Weber's previous books, nothing could be further from the truth. This book is all about how the author has modified his business model that he wrote about in previous books. And anyone who is into online sales of other peoples' junk probably should part with a little cash and get this book. I suspect it will be well worth the purchase price to them.

As I say at the outset, I LIKED this book. Unfortunately that won't get it a 5-star rating from me. I have to love it for the top mark to be granted. I can love a book because it is really cool, informative, and well written, or touches a topic that is close to my heart. Online retail sales is not a topic close to my heart so the book would have had to be really special to get a 5. It's a good book, but it's just not that special. 4 stars!