Launching AntlerSheds.Com!

By Jon Waraas - First Published: July 17th, 2024

Exploring the Launch of My Latest Venture: AntlerSheds.com

I first got involved in the antler shed market back in 2009 when I designed and managed a website called TheAntlerPatch.com for a local shed hunter.

After a few years of managing his antler website, around 2013, he approached me and asked if I wanted to invest in about $20,000 worth of antler sheds to resell on his website.

Long story short, my business partner and I gave him the money to buy the antlers, and he never returned with the antlers. He ran off with our money. I had to "repossess" his website to try and salvage the funds he stole.

The problem was that I had never run an antler business before.

That business floundered until I gave up on it.

It was around 2016 that I also built AntlerBuyers.com, a website where people can browse and review antler buyers to help warn others about potential frauds.

That website has been performing well and currently ranks highly for key phrases such as "antler prices" on Google.

In 2014ish we (business partner and I) also purchased the domain name AntlerSheds.com for $700 from a private buyer.

We have sat on that great domain name until now.

After launching AntlerBuyers.com, we realized there was significant interest from people wanting to sell antler sheds they had found or inherited. We almost daily receive emails from individuals looking to sell their antler sheds.

To address this need, we launched AntlerSheds.com.

You can list your antler sheds for free on AntlerSheds.com - All we require is a valid email address.

I think eBay's current commission fee is around 15%, then add in the merchant fees (around 3%) and order fees ($0.30 ish), and the cut from eBay is pretty gnarly.

Our website will have the same classified system as eBay, but for FREE.

How Was AntlerSheds.Com Built?

From scratch. The whole website was built from scratch using some preexisting functions that I used from AntlerBuyers.com and Waraas.com.

The CMS (content management system) is primarily sourced from Waraas.com, whereas the login system is adapted from AntlerBuyers.com.

Other parts of the website, such as the actual classifieds system, are built from total scratch.

You can see that just by looking at the website, it's very basic.

Currently, AntlerSheds.com is in a soft launch phase, meaning the website is live even though it's still under development. This approach allows me to test the code and ensure everything runs smoothly before expanding its features.

I monitor the error and session logs to check the website's performance. My focus is to refine the core components-CMS, login system, and cookies-to ensure they function flawlessly before adding more features.

At this stage, users can list their antlers for sale, create an account, and view their listings on the backend.

The next update, which will happen tomorrow, will add a messaging system, and automatically create a user account when listing an antler.

I will also have some nice looking banners created to add onto AntlerBuyers.com to start driving traffic.

I will also start Facebook ads soon, to drive traffic.

What's Your Goal?

You might be wondering to yourself... why are you spending so many hours creating a free service?

The reason... we will be selling our own antler sheds and antler chews alongside other sellers.

The free listings drive targeted traffic that will help increase our own sales.

At this time, we do not plan to charge a commission or flat fee on AntlerSheds.com.

I hope you enjoyed this blog post about the launch of AntlerSheds.com. I will continue to discuss this project and introduce new features here on my blog. Please leave a comment with any questions or suggestions you might have! :)

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