One Ten Dollar Bill

Hey!

I was surfing the net and ran into this cool site. http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.com/

This guy started with a paperclip and is trying to make trade after trade until he ends up with a house! How cool is that? When I saw this, I thought, “Why didn’t I think of that?” So I thought of something different, but I have to say that Kyle at One Red Paperclip is my inspiration! I hope he gets his house some day.

Well, I couldn’t steal his idea outright, so mine is similar, but a bit different. My idea isn’t to trade for things, but rather to buy something and sell it for more money. The money I make from that will go toward the next item. As my money pool grows, so will the things I buy and sell for. So.... Really... I am using green paper (money) to flip items (to flip something means to buy it and sell it really quick for a profit). Of course my site should naturally be called "One Green-Paper Flip", which is a great play on words from One Red Paperclip! I'm a genius! (Actually my wife thought of it. Thanks snookems!) We'll just forget the fact that Canadian money is mostly not green.

My first thought was to do all my buying and selling on Ebay. This is a good medium, but after taking a quick look, it was obvious that when I was buying things, the shipping costs would kill me until I reached high value items. So for now at least, I will look for good deals locally, and then turn around and sell them on Ebay and other cheap selling boards.

The other thing I need is a starting place. To start with one red paperclip is cool, but the ebay fees would likely kill me. And besides, who is going to want to pay for shipping for a red paperclip. So to get over the Ebay fees, I think I’ll just start with some seed money… maybe something like $10. After a few items, I’ll “withdraw” my $10 from my trading account. To turn $10 into some huge amount (like enough to buy a house) would also be pretty cool.

So, there you have it. It is Currently June 1st, 2006 and I am sitting here with my $10 seed money on my desk. Now I just have to come up with a strategy.

I guess I need to find something that people want… don’t want to get stuck with something forever. And it should be something small so that the shipping fees are small. I mean who wants to pay $30 in shipping fees for a $10 item?Wish me luck. Maybe some day I’ll be as famous as that One Red Paperclip dude. I’m not really an Alice Cooper fan, but I could handle it if I ended up on stage with say, Our Lady Peace!