• Guest, Help The DPF Community Thrive - Join Our Donation Drive Today!

    We're launching a special DPF Donation Drive to ensure our beloved forum continues to flourish. Your support is vital in helping us cover essential server costs and keep our community running smoothly — This is more than just a donation; it's an investment in the future of our community.

    Join us in this crucial drive and let's ensure our forum remains a vibrant and dynamic place for everyone.

    Please visit the DPF Donation Drive Thread for details and instructions on how you can make your donation today!

US & UK Trade Relations

Status
Not open for further replies.
US & UK Trade Relations
L

lbrown193

New DPF Member
Rating - 94.4%
17   1   0
Messages
521
Location
London, UK
Has something happened in the last few months? It seems that there arent as many trades going on and theres not much interest in UK traders/sellers posts on the forum. Especially if they have a listing in £'s not $'s. What have I missed?
 
I feel like the reputation of European traders has taken a hit since some European traders have not been honoring trades. I have always had great trades with both UK and French traders, but that is what I sense from facebook groups discussing the issue...
 
I think it is just because trading is alot bigger in the US and in the UK and europe it is harder for us to get new releases and the inflated prices dont help.
Also its probably just a small percentage of people in europe not honoring trades
 
There are plenty of US traders that haven't been honouring their trades either. I always emphasise that there are sharks and unfair people in every part of the world and you shouldn't generalise.

That being said... Yes, Europeans are frowned upon. And that really saddens me sometimes but it can't be changed. The only thing you can do is just not think about it and do what you do. After a while, people will realise you're to be trusted and you'll start to meet US traders that regularly buy/trade with you and they'll talk about it to their friends, etc... And after a while you'll realise that the people who choose to generalise and not give you a chance aren't worth your time of frustration. Everyone makes their own choices and if someone chooses to refuse your offer(s) because you're European, so be it. Leave it at that and leave.

This is a lesson I learned myself, I've been stuck in a corner a lot because people judge me for being European. But I don't let it get to me, there are more people that accept me than people who don't and I'm happy with where I (and most of my European friends) am now. I've met some amazing international traders. :)
 
I've traded / sold / bought from European traders and I have a friend I regularly trade with. It's harder to trade with Europeans because of the cost of shipping and no tracking information (unless you want to spend more on top of that). It's a turn off to a lot of traders who are used to shipping everything for $2 here in the US.

If I trade with any person not in the US, not just in Europe, I try to make sure that the value of what we are each getting is worth the shipping (ie, I wont trade ONE OE for ONE OE to Europe because it'll probably be cheaper to trade more or to just buy the OE in the secondary market).

As for the trades, there are people from both US and UK that don't honor trades, be aware of them and be vocal about not trading with them...especially when tracking is nonexistent and both parties are just waiting and hoping they didn't just lose out on pins.
 
lbrown193 said:
Has something happened in the last few months? It seems that there arent as many trades going on and theres not much interest in UK traders/sellers posts on the forum. Especially if they have a listing in £'s not $'s. What have I missed?
Click to expand...

As for the comment I added on your other post, I have seen a lot of people on facebook post traders (some HTF, others not so much) and include that they are in the UK / Europe etc, and have no responses whatsoever...but people with the exact same pin in the US have like 10+ comments with people asking what they collect, tagging people they know would like it and offering pins....so that's where it was coming from!
 
I've found it a lot harder to trade lately, I've found that increased postage costs is not helping. Personally for me I think that I have too many HTF wants but there are some that should be easy to get yet aren't.

I agree that there is an increased negativity around European traders, I'm grateful for having some great trading friends who help me out with current releases.

I'm not sure that this going to change anytime soon unfortunately, I feel that the hobby is changing.
 
I have made very few trades with the international community but recently I have made several sales to the international community and everything was perfect. I am happy to sale or trade with the international community. I am mostly concentrating on selling right now (as we are trying to concentrate on our core collections) so I am not watching the Trade Threads much...but if you see I have something you need and you have something I need please feel free to make an equitable trade offer.

We are an interconnected family of pin enthusiasts, your location on this planet is of no consequence, as long as you are on this planet...I just can't send mail to the International Space Station even though NASA is in my back yard!
​
 
Last edited:
What I find is that our Europe pins are very under valued which makes it a lot harder for us here in the uk/Europe and I find that people say its to expensive to trade over seas but yet they all seem to change there mind as soon as there's a tangled/frozen pin that's released and I've helped people on here before but when I need help later on they don't want to do the same which is such a shame :(
 
Last edited:
I think it may be mainly because of cost. That's why if I trade internationally, I try to trade multiple pins instead of only one pin (to reduce the cost of shipping per pin). But also, customs fees might deter US traders from trading/selling to international traders/buyers. If the US trader/seller feels the cost of the pin(s) is the perceived cost (e.g. what it is selling for on auction) rather than retail cost, they will want to mark the customs tag with the amount; however, the international trader/buyer will have to pay more customs fees when the tag says over $20US. If buyer and seller can't come to an agreement about it, then the US trader/seller won't sell.
 
As a relitively new trader (London UK) I find this sad but I do understand the apprehension on both sides. I always private message the person I'm trading with my proof of postage receipt the moment it's handed to me. I've only traded OE's so far and have some LEs that I'd be willing to trade abroad but I'd be pretty nervous until they got there and the trade got to me, etc. But it simply isn't fair to tar a massive group of people with the same brush.
 
Last edited:
I second what Olaf says. While I don't trade much, OlafOlaf and I were able to make a trade for one of my grails. Without her help, I'd probably still be looking for it. So, I love the europeans based on my trading with her!

Speaking of which Olaf..If you remember our last trade, the new ones are out. So, let me know. :)

OlafOlaf said:
There are plenty of US traders that haven't been honouring their trades either. I always emphasise that there are sharks and unfair people in every part of the world and you shouldn't generalise.

That being said... Yes, Europeans are frowned upon. And that really saddens me sometimes but it can't be changed. The only thing you can do is just not think about it and do what you do. After a while, people will realise you're to be trusted and you'll start to meet US traders that regularly buy/trade with you and they'll talk about it to their friends, etc... And after a while you'll realise that the people who choose to generalise and not give you a chance aren't worth your time of frustration. Everyone makes their own choices and if someone chooses to refuse your offer(s) because you're European, so be it. Leave it at that and leave.

This is a lesson I learned myself, I've been stuck in a corner a lot because people judge me for being European. But I don't let it get to me, there are more people that accept me than people who don't and I'm happy with where I (and most of my European friends) am now. I've met some amazing international traders. :)
Click to expand...
 
The lack of reliable, inexpensive trackable shipping is a major deterrent when trading grails. I do trade internationally on occasion, not as much since the post office raised the international rates.
 
I see some really nice pins come out of Europe as well as Japan and Hong Kong. I would hope that there would be a positive flow of good exchanges of pins from different locations. Even though I almost never trade, I would love to have ongoing relationships with collectors outside of the U.S. I hope that non-U.S. collectors are able to get the U.S. pins they want for their collections!
 
OlafOlaf said:
...............................
That being said... Yes, Europeans are frowned upon. And that really saddens me sometimes but it can't be changed. The only thing you can do is just not think about it and do what you do. After a while, people will realise you're to be trusted and you'll start to meet US traders that regularly buy/trade with you and they'll talk about it to their friends, etc... And after a while you'll realise that the people who choose to generalise and not give you a chance aren't worth your time of frustration....................... :)
Click to expand...

+1.
 
I am with Starry_ solo. The lack of affordable reliable international tracking is part of the reason I do not really want to deal with overseas. I trade fairly regularly with disneyqueenuk so I don't really have much call to do it. She can usually take care of anything I want over there.

As far as undervaluing UK pins goes, well let's look at it. Yes Tangled and Frozen pins in the European market are very popular, but the ones in the US are the same way. Anytime there is a release of pins with those themes people come out of the woodwork looking for them. It is not just when there is a European release. Let's face it, pins of characters like the Reluctant Dragon are not going to get a lot of interest in comparison.
 
starry_solo said:
The lack of reliable, inexpensive trackable shipping is a major deterrent when trading grails. I do trade internationally on occasion, not as much since the post office raised the international rates.
Click to expand...

Pretty much this.

I'm not against dealing with international members at all, but the costs usually make me avoid it if I can others within my country instead.
 
As a person who hasn't even started to trade, but was looking forward to it, this topic makes me a little sad : ( Postage prices are a huge pain and that's very true but apart from that I would hope that people wouldn't judge me simply on my current location. Hopefully when I have built up some trader pins and started to trade, people will give me a chance! :)
 
I am a UK trader and pretty much gave up, in my experience most of the time as soon as someone finds out you're from the UK the trade is off, it's stupid excuses like "I can't be bothered with the custom forms" or "it'll get lost" custom forms are very simple and I've never had a parcel lost from US to UK and have had a few lost within the UK the distance doesn't make a difference :/
 
This is odd; I haven't come across people not wanting to trade with me just because I'm in the UK much. Maybe a couple times, but that's it. But perhaps its because I've been on this site for a while and have accumulated quite a bit of positive feedback.

Yes the international shipping rates going up was a very annoying problem however; but that's why a few folks I've traded with have done multiple trades instead. I also have sold quite a few pins overseas and people didn't seem bothered that they were coming from the UK.
 
Yes there are, but I've never been able to go to one as there are none (as far as I know) in Suffolk/Norfolk. Anybody else near Norwich!? We need some sort of pin trading meetup.
 
I go to a pin meet in fareham its in the scout hall there is 3 a year the first is march secound is July and the 3rd is November the is a facebook page for them it's called Southampton pin traders you have to ask to join the group through hope this helps
 
I've never had a problem trading with international traders. I've just been too busy in the last couple of months to trade at all...
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top