I stumbled upon this website while looking for more gel blaster fields on the Gold Coast and this seems interesting.
The website is supposed to be a better alternative to selling second hand gel blasters over facebook or discord with more security and customer protection, so far theres a plenty amount of listings on the marketplace ranging from 3D printed name tags to a couple of accessories and a beretta pistol.
Its got lists of verified stores and fields in a specific area which can be helpful for any newcomer wanting to know where to buy or play with gel blasters. There’s detailed guides about scams, gel blaster laws, CQB tactics and selling and buying gel blasters so this websites got a good bunch of stuff in it
Seems like a neat idea. Though so far I’ve had good results from discord buy and sells without the middle man fees.
As always. Things to be aware of buying second hand:
There is no warranty or guarantee. I strongly recommend only buying second hand if you can either fix it or the deal is good enough you can pay someone to fix it.
Assume it’s stuffed. Often if it works it’s near end of service and will need repair. Just because it’s working does not necessarily mean it will work for long.
If the model has known issues, second hand will likely have said issue.
Be aware of the potential issues and repairs you may be up for, and often there are good deals.
The second hand market is still very much bottomed out currently so you can often get something for less than half the RRP.
That though is very likely to start changing as supply is limited for new blasters atm, and existing stock prices are starting to creep up across retailers.
Spy a used blaster you like, then go and do some heavy research on parts availability… either on this forum or in airsoft forums. Often leaving “gel blaster” out of your search criteria gives you tons of tech info about blasters that are airsoft crossovers. Handy to know sometimes.
Nothing worse than picking up a secondhand gel blaster only to find that a totally proprietry part is broken and replacements are unavailable. In that case, you’re better off springing for a new unit.
Unless of course you’re okay with just a wall hanger.
thanks so much for the kind words - I’m Patrick, the one behind RedSpear.
Discord works for direct sales and I would lie if I would say I never had a look at that haha
But the marketplace handles buyer and seller payment protection, dispute resolution, and keeps listings searchable etc. The five percent covers payment processing, hosting, and maintenance. I’ve always been a big fan of transparency and those 5% are because of 1.75% + 30 cents Shopify payment fee (this is what I get charged per payment) and then the other 3-ish percent are purely there to cover my expenses for the Shopify platform and some Shopify apps I need to use. I know, no-one asked about that info haha but as I said, I just want people to understand and that I am not here to get rich.
Happy to answer any questions about how it works or whatsoever. See you guys on the fields like Blacksite and Donnybrook
Cheers guys, let’s see but even if the marketplace doesnt take off, it will still be a hub for anything gel blaster related. And if you have any ideas or want to see anything else on the website, just let me know
Fair enough mate! I did consider offering PayPal as well but it would cause charges of 5.9% just from them and I’d need to charge then overall 10% to cover those fees and then my own Shopify platform fee etc.
Another reason is that PayPal’s policy covers 180 days. So, if on day 179 of the purchase the buyer thinks the used gel blaster is not as good as they thought or whatsoever and they put a dispute through, then it would be my problem as PayPal
would take the refund from me. I think we both agree that this 6 months policy covering used gel blaster can put the whole marketplace in jeopardy.
So, re the fees - it didn’t feel right to me to ask for a 10% commission to cover the cost expenses.
Hope that make sense mate but as mentioned above, I get where you are coming from.
glad you like it and yeah, let’s see if the rifle gets a new home soon!