Looking for Vintage Costume Jewelry? A Quick-Start Guide to Bidding on eBay (Part I)

"Vintage jewelry" and "vintage costume jewelry" are consistently ranked among the top searches on Ebay. I've done the majority of my purchasing of vintage jewelry - both for my personal collection and for my vintage jewelry website - from Ebay. And so has my husband. And boy, we have made some outstanding mistakes! But that's another article altogether. The following tips are a compilation of what we've learned in the process:

Don't buy from a fuzzy picture. No matter how much you squint your eyes, widen your eyes or tilt your head, it's still gonna be a fuzzy picture. Most folks who try to sell on Ebay will take the time to post a decent picture. However, unless I know the jewelry piece by sight and/or it's at such an incredibly low bid amount that I almost literally can't go wrong, I by and large don't bid based on a fuzzy picture. Remember, you're purchasing on Ebay "sight-unseen" so that picture is vitally important; it's the only visual you have to go on when deciding whether you're going to part with some of your hard-earned money. "When in doubt, back out."

Speaking of pictures, don't be afraid to contact the seller and request more pictures. Ebay allows one free picture per item but charges for every one after that so it's only natural that sellers want to keep their overhead down and thus tend to supply only one picture. But that doesn't mean they can't email you more upon your request. If they're interested in selliing their item and they're a conscientious seller, they should have no problem with this.

And speaking of pictures again, if the listing says something like, "..stamped WEISS on the back," go ahead and ask for a picture of the back. Not that the jewelry isn't stamped, but rather to help make sure you're not bidding on a fake or reproduction. Yep, fake costume jewelry, can you believe that? An excellent source of both pictures and descriptions of vintage costume jewelry marks can be found online at http://www.illusionjewels.com/costumejewelrymarks.html