Rookie question

[Frysende]

I've been browsing YJ through Rinkya and SMJ and have found a particular seller who offers cels I'm pining for, but with the stipulation that they don't do international shipping. Since I'd be using a proxy, does that mean the seller would ship to Rinkya/SMJ/whomever and then to me, or am I just not able to bid on the auctions because the final destination is the US?

[Animechaos]

You can bid on it. Deputy services like ours has offices in Japan (ours in Tokyo), so the international shipping problem is no longer an issue. Most won't ship overseas, and that's why we exist.

[tarakatsuki]

Aleado Yahoo Japan is definitely the easiest way to browse auctions! Just replace my search term with whatever you're looking for. But as far as the deputy services go, yes, when you bid on an item, it ships to the office/warehouse in Japan that belongs to whatever deputy you decide to use. There is no possible way for the seller to know where the deputy is going to ship the package to next. All that matters is that the seller is shipping the package to another address in Japan.

[sensei]

I have seen some sellers (not lately) that will add a notice (in English) stating that bids from Rinkya, Celga, and SMJ will be blocked and foreign buyers will be forced to use the seller's preferred deputy service. I thought of this recently when a bid of mine did not go through for "unknown reasons" (according to my DS). But the item went unsold and the next time it came up I placed a manual bid (my previous one was set to be placed at a preset time close to the end of the auction), and that went through without a hitch, so I think it was just one of those temp bugs.

In the past I've heard about some sentiments expressed by Japanese collectors that foreigners provide unnecessary competition, and high-end cels should be considered national treasures. Mandarake, however, has never had such a policy and has been very friendly to overseas buyers. But now that Rinkya (and I assume other services) use anonymous buyers' handles and as Japanese-owned deputy services have sprung up, I think that such resistance is no longer an issue. In any case, as Nick says, the standard line that "International shipping is not provided" just means that this particular seller does not have that facility. Deputy services handle all of that now.

Also worth remembering: Rinkya and SMJ also provide direct purchase services from Japanese stores that don't do overseas shipping. Just don't try to buy car parts, dolfies that come with huge glass-front cases or levitating suitcases, or other such items.

[Animechaos]

But we do car parts, dollfies (with cases), and alien technology too.

[AnimeDad]

Super noobie question here on the same topic. Since Mandarake does not go through a deputy, how are their shipping prices? I couldn't find any mention of actual numbers on their website so I'm curious as to what I would be getting into for a cel or two. (There are a couple of really cheap (so far) cels on the site I would like to bid on.) I did find fees for Yahoo Japan through Rinkya, and they certainly add up.

Thanks,
AnimeDad

[sensei]

I have not used Mandarake very often, but according to records still in my email folders, they have charged between 1200 JPY (for a small packet of sketches) to 2000 JPY (for a grandly oversized cel + background) That's between $11.00 and $18.50. The disadvantage is that when you win something, they will immediately pack it and charge you for shipping, item by item. Deputy services allow you to accumulate a boxful of winnings and combine shipping for all.

Yes, the fees are an irritation, but I find them most onerous for cheap non-cel winnings. A little plastic cup with an anime character on it can sell for 1000 yen ($9.25) and end up costing you over $40.00 when the standard minimum commission and handling charges get added. On the other hand, more expensive items can be proportionally better deals, as the fees increase more slowly than the cost of the item. I've gotten by with the $20 rule: Divide the winning price by 1000 and add 20. That more-or-less gives you a decent guess as to the actual price in US$ you'll pay.

Example 1. A single douga matching a cel Sensei owns: 2000 yen --> my cost $40.35
Example 2. Sketch set for a CGI series Sensei likes: 3000 yen --> my cost $49.03
Example 3. Rilezu (post-production cel) for a CGI series Sensei thinks is a masterpiece: 16000 yen --> my cost $172.14

As you can see the worst case is +$20 and change, and as the winning bid increases, the amount over the price divided by 100 gradually diminishes. And if you buy multiple items from the same seller in the same day, then you're forgiven the domestic fees, and in many low-ticket auctions the service will also forgive some or all of the commission.

But one can get very fussy about the fees and what they are. I just ask, "Is it worth it to me to pay (say) $172.14 to possess that item?" If the answer is "yes," then how much of it goes to the seller and how much to the deputy service is moot.

[cutiebunny]

I like SMJ for a deputy service. $4 flat fee for every auction is nice. I used to use Buyee but then they changed their storage time from 60 to 30 days. I don't buy that much as is, so charging me a daily fee on Day 31 to use Buyee until I win another auction with their service makes no sense to me.

Lately, I've been paying about $20 per standard size cel sent via EMS from Mandarake. I haven't combined multiple items from the same location from Mandarake in a while, but they usually allow you to combine if the wins are within a couple days of each other and from the same location. For example, if you win a cel from Mandarake Nakano on Monday and another cel from Nakano on Tuesday, you could combine those in the same package. But if you win a cel from the Nakano branch on Monday and another from the Grandchaos branch on Tuesday, those can not be combined. During the Big Web Auction on Mandarake, after paying a 500 yen fee to just bid, you can combine all BWA items won together for one shipping fee as long as you let the staff there know that you plan on bidding and winning other items. They'll send you a total after all the auctions have completed with all the items, their commission fee (10% of the final auction price for each item) and the combined shipping fee.

[AnimeDad]

Sensei and Cuttiebunny -- Great info. Thanks. I need to learn more about deputy services. Other than hitting Google, are there any tips you can give? Or, is it pretty self explanatory?

[sensei]

Rinkya's explanation pages are rather hard to find: this is a good place to start:

https://www.rinkya.com/en/page/what-does-rinkya-do

And the sidebar gives you some other pages to explore (including cool jobs you can apply for if you're living in Japan!). I found this set of pages by mousing over the "i" icon at the top of the page. I'm sure that SMJ has a similar set of explanatory pages.

However, in truth one has to take the plunge and try out the bidding/paying/shipping process. I did this by trying out the process on some lower-priced cels before moving ahead and going for some more expensive items. My experience with both SMJ and Rinkya has been positive for the most part. (And I admit that I once confused the hell out of some persistent Japanese bidders by bidding against my SMJ self with my Rinkya account.) The choice of which you use is, I think, mostly the result of a lot of intangibles rather than any single definable factor. But don't be shy to ask. Rinkya's customer service is very good, and SMJ's was also very responsive in my experience.

Celga fans?

[cutiebunny]

Packaging-wise, I gotta go with Buyee. Of the four deputy services I've used, Buyee's packaging is superior. I would always pay $10(?) extra for their premium packing service, and it was almost as if they just wrapped each item in a small package of bubble wrap. I'd buy a couple sketches and cels and they'd arrive in a box large enough to hold a small TV. Nothing ever arrived damaged from Buyee, including a cel that the original seller put in the flimsiest envelope in existence.

Obviously, the longer you do business with a deputy and the more items you buy through a deputy, you're going to encounter a snag or two along the way. I've had problems with deputy services before, but considering how many items I've purchased through deputy services over an almost 15 year period of collecting artwork, 99% of all transactions are hassle-free and the items arrive in great shape. It's hard when that 1% occurs, especially if it's something you really wanted and it arrives damaged or not at all, but it does occur.