Liquidation Or Wholesale? A Big Difference

Liquidation typically means the company is trying to turn assets (overstock and returned inventory) into cash. Excess overstock and returned inventory costs retailers money because the goods depreciate with age, take up space in the warehouse, and tie up capital. Therefore, retailers are willing to sell excess inventory at a loss to avoid those costs. When liquidation inventory is sold, it is usually in bulk and in negotiated transactions to a few large distributors. These sales are generally at prices well below retail MSRP. Rather than doing this, retailers like Walmart, Sam’s Club, and Macy’s have turned to B-Stock Solutions to build and manage private auction marketplaces to create more efficient and dependable distribution of these bulk lots directly to a large market liquidation buyers who are part of the B-Stock Sourcing Network. This provides liquidation buyers with direct access to retailers and access to highly discounted inventory that they previously could not access. The inventory is generally listed at a fraction of MSRP, with listings worth thousands of dollars starting at only $1 or $100. Liquidation buyers really appreciate getting direct access to retailers and discounted overstock inventory that they were never previously able to buy.

Wholesale, on the other hand, is the sale of goods and merchandise to resellers and businesses, usually sold in bulk quantities, to be retailed by others. True wholesaling is generally not available to the standard consumer. Wholesalers usually pack in bulk lots and redistribute in smaller lots. The wholesale price is usually fixed and the amount of product can vary substantially. Wholesalers frequently purchase large liquidation bulk lots from large liquidators, break those lots apart, and then repack and redistribute them in smaller lots to smaller retailers and resellers.

About the B-Stock Sourcing Network

The B-Stock Sourcing network is made up of private liquidation auction marketplaces that B-Stock Solutions powers and manages for large retailers such as Macy’s, Walmart, and Sam’s Club, among others. We enable these retailers to auction off their excess inventory directly to smaller resellers at a fraction of MSRP. Thousands of resellers love the B-Stock Sourcing Network because we provide them direct access to retailers and overstock inventory that they were previously never able to buy. Buyers can bid on excess inventory with confidence, knowing whom they’re buying from, and what they can expect.