How To Make Money Flipping Costco and Amazon Returns

If you’ve ever wondered what it actually looks like to turn other people’s returned junk into serious money, buckle up.

If you want to catch Shannon’s first appearance on the show. Find it here.

Welcome to the Return Apocalypse

January, February, and March are peak return season. Shannon calls it the “return apocalypse.”

December 26th at Costco?

Yeah, there’s a whole segment of society returning their Christmas trees because they just “don’t need it anymore.” Sounds insane, but those returns create opportunities.

Right now, there are literally hundreds of auctions closing every single day. We’re talking:

• $67,309 worth of dishwashers, refrigerators, and microwaves that sold for $3,040 (4.5% of retail)
• $19,539 worth of furniture that sold for $2,526
• $1,600 worth of diapers for $300 (yes, people return diapers)

The deals are there. You just need to know where to look and what to look for.

The B-Stock Marketplace: Where the Real Deals Live

Shannon’s favorite platform is B-Stock.

Why? Because they don’t own any inventory. They’re just the marketplace.

This matters because most “wholesale” sites are buying from these big suppliers and marking it up before selling to you. B-Stock cuts out the middleman, you’re buying direct from Costco, Target, Amazon, and other major retailers.

No cherry-picking. No markups. Just raw liquidation deals.

Live Deal Breakdown: The Le Creuset Play

Here’s a real example Shannon showed us: a 166-piece Le Creuset cookware set. This is high-end French cookware, individual pans can run $300-400 each.

Costco sells the full red kit for $5,000.

The auction was sitting at $2,600 with 27 minutes left. Seems expensive, right? Almost half of retail plus freight costs.

But here’s the angle: don’t sell it as a set. Part it out.

Those individual pans, griddles, Dutch ovens, and pots?

There’s roughly $10,000 worth of value when you break them apart and sell the pieces on eBay and Facebook Marketplace.

People who got a Le Creuset set as a wedding gift and ruined one piece?

They’re not buying the whole set again, they’re searching for that one replacement pan. That’s your customer.

The money is in the pieces, not the bundle.

The Mattress Arbitrage

Shannon showed us a deal on three brand-new mattresses:

• Retail: $3,150 total
• Auction price (with 45 minutes left): About $150 per unit
• Your landed cost: Roughly a third of Costco’s price

If you’re near Ontario, California (where these were located), shipping costs are minimal.

Flip them on Facebook Marketplace. Easy money.

Pro tip: Never buy customer return mattresses. Only brand new. For obvious reasons.

Seasonal Gold: Christmas Trees in January

This is peak seasonal arbitrage territory.

One auction: $12,784 worth of Christmas stuff sold for $1,000.

Just the top few line items included:

• $1,150 Christmas tree
• $750 Christmas tree
• Multiple $460 Christmas trees

Average cost at Costco: $103 per unit. Your average cost if you won this deal: $8.06 per unit.

You can sit on it for nine months and start selling again in October, or just list it now, people buy Christmas decorations year-round.

The seasonal arbitrage is massive.

The Boring Stuff Makes Money

Shannon keeps emphasizing this: sexy stuff has lower margins and more competition.

Boring products are where the money is.

Adjustable desks example:

• Costco retail: $4,100
• Sold for: $500
• Your cost per unit after freight: About $45-50

Can you sell these for enough to make it worth your time? That’s the question you need to answer before bidding.

Do the research first, calculate your landed cost (purchase price + freight), and know your numbers.

If you can sell the whole lot for $3,000 and you’re all-in at $1,500, is making $1,500 worth it to you?

Only you can answer that.

Beyond Costco: The Liquidation Landscape

ACE Hardware and Power Equipment

Mowers, construction equipment, outdoor tools, all available through ACE liquidations.

Real example: A $2,000 mower in like-new condition sold for $519 in upstate New York. Six bids total.

Why?

Because it’s buried in snow up there and nobody’s thinking about mowers in January.

That’s where the deals are. Buy off-season, sell when demand hits.

Target: The Live-Selling Goldmine

If you’re into live selling on platforms like Whatnot or Poshmark, Target returns are incredible.

One auction: $22,000 worth of shoes (cut that retail lie in half to $11,000) with 500 pairs sold for $925. That’s $1.85 per unit.

You can move 500 pairs of shoes in a week doing live selling.

Three shows, holding up shoes, running 30-second auctions for $5-8 per pair. The inventory moves fast.

Listing 500 pairs individually on eBay?

That’s a nightmare. Holding them up on camera and talking about them for 30 seconds each? That’s a business model.

Kohler: The Contractor Connection

Kohler liquidates lighting fixtures, bathroom accessories, and plumbing supplies every single day.

Real deal: $44,000 worth of bathroom accessories sold for $600. Another auction: $109,000 worth of lighting sold for $500.

Here’s Shannon’s play: Don’t compete on eBay where it’s flooded. Instead, build a network.

Download the manifests. Share them with property managers, realtors, contractors, and remodelers.

Tell them you’re “approved by Kohler to help liquidate their products” (you are, anyone can bid).

Don’t sell anything yet, just build relationships.

When they ask what you’d charge, give them lowball numbers.

You bought $44,000 worth of product for $600, you have room to work.

Use eBay as a fishing expedition: only list things in bulk (4-packs, 8-packs, 10-packs) to attract contractors who need volume.

That’s how you build your customer base.

Government Auctions: Black Hawks and Thunder Pigs

Yes, you can buy a decommissioned Black Hawk helicopter. Current bid: $400K.

Shannon loves government auctions. GSA Auctions (gsaauctions.gov) is where the federal government sells everything from aircraft to real estate to thousands of vehicles.

Most of this stuff sells to dealers, but you can register as an individual and buy direct. No dealer license needed.

The Thunder Pig play: Shannon showed us a massive cargo plane fuselage for $5,000.

His take? Buy it, drag it onto your property, turn it into an Airbnb.

It’s sitting behind an air museum in Colorado just waiting for someone with vision.

GovDeals is another platform with hundreds of categories.

Shannon bought a Polaris four-wheeler from a mosquito abatement district in Nevada for $3,000 and drove it to one of his properties.

BidSpotter: Industrial Liquidations Made Accessible

BidSpotter sells entire factories and product lines, which sounds intimidating. But here’s what most people miss: they sell this stuff piece by piece.

You don’t need to buy an entire woodworking shop. You can buy individual DeWalt saws and Craftsman tools, all starting at $1.

You can sort by location to find stuff near you. A lot of it ships. There are constant opportunities here.

The Live Selling Revolution

Gary Vee won’t shut up about live selling, and for good reason.

Shannon’s mastermind members who do live selling are crushing it.

Why Live Selling Works

It’s a personality business. People come back for you, not just the deals.

The successful sellers are up there talking to their audience more than selling. They’re building relationships:

• “What size do you need? I’ll find it for you”
• “Great to see you again!”
• “Hey, thanks for coming back”

Once you build that audience, people show up because they want to talk to you. What you’re selling almost becomes secondary.

One member sold $1,800 worth of Costco returned food in 90 minutes.

Just loading up Priority Mail boxes on camera, dropping stuff in, running quick auctions.

Boom, boom, next, next, next.

Should You Niche Down?

Should you be “the Target shoe person” or should you sell whatever deals you find?

Shannon says you can do both.

Start with a niche if you want (shoes, handbags, apparel), build your audience there, then expand as you go.

The key is the personality. If people like watching you, they’ll come back whether you’re selling shoes today or Blackstone griddles tomorrow.

There’s even a husband-and-wife team selling entire pallets of Hanes t-shirts.

People tune in to watch them bicker and interact with each other. The entertainment is the product.

When Deals Go Sideways

Not everything works out perfectly. Shannon’s real about this.

The Partial Disaster

More common than an entire deal going bad is when parts of it fail. You buy 50 items planning on the 5 high-dollar pieces carrying the whole purchase. Then those 5 pieces show up damaged.

Customer returns aren’t tested. Nobody’s inspecting every single item. Some warehouse worker is making subjective calls: “This is good condition, this is fair, this is damaged.”

Stuff slips through the cracks.

The solution: Become resourceful. Where do you buy replacement parts? How do you repair this? Can you sell parts of the damaged item?

Shannon bought $1,700 toilets and one showed up cracked. Instead of filing a dispute, he problem-solved.

What can you salvage? Can you sell the tank separately? The seat? The hardware?

The Research Failure

When an entire deal goes bad, it’s usually because you didn’t do your research.

You saw the retail price ($30,000!), the auction price ($5,000!), and thought you couldn’t lose. But you didn’t check:

• How fast does this stuff actually sell?
• What’s the real market price (not the inflated retail)?
• How many units move per month?

Getting a great deal doesn’t matter if you can only sell one unit per month.

Your cash flow gets destroyed.

Shannon’s advice: Don’t file disputes unless you absolutely have to.

Be a problem solver for the supplier, not a problem for them. Build that reputation.

Fall in Love With Problem Solving

This is the mindset shift that separates winners from quitters.

If your attitude is “these problems are keeping me from making money,” you’re going to have a bad time and this business isn’t for you.

If you can fall in love with problem solving, you’re unstoppable.

Bonus: Complex, large, or expensive products scare most people away. That means less competition.

If you’re the person who says “yeah, I’ll figure it out,” you can command higher prices and dominate a niche everyone else is avoiding.

The Jim Rowe Story: From Hinges to Mini-Costco

Jim was an early member of Shannon’s mastermind. He had business experience, so he could move fast.

Shannon posted about high-security door hinges from a GovDeals auction in California.

These are specialized piano hinges that run the full length of hotel doors. Brand new retail: $200 each. The lot had 900 pieces.

Jim’s in Washington, so there’s freight to factor in.

But he did the math: scrap value of the aluminum alone was $3,500. That’s his safety net.

He won the auction for around $1,000.

The Play

Jim called the manufacturer. First sales rep wasn’t helpful.

Second sales rep says: “Actually, I have a customer who needs these.

We can’t get them right now. Let me give you their number.”

Jim calls the customer, offers 100 units. They negotiate…

Jim ends up selling 200 units at $50 each ($10,000 total), making his entire investment back plus profit while still holding 700 units.

The Evolution

Jim’s 90 minutes from the nearest Costco. So he thought: why not just become a mini-Costco for my local community?

He took over an old Sears store (6,000 square feet) and stocks it like Costco.

Everything from bottled water and toilet paper to furniture and housewares.

First year projection: $1 million in sales.

His whole mindset: make $1,000, 700 times.

Not “make $700,000” (too abstract), but break it down into repeatable wins.

Everyone listening can make $1,000 flipping stuff. If you can do it once, you can do it 700 times.

The Power of Small Numbers

Shannon’s obsessed with this concept: chase $100 bills your whole life, and they stack up fast.

Don’t chase millions. Don’t even chase tens of thousands. Just chase quick wins that you can repeat.

Build a system where you’re stacking those wins over and over. The compound effect is massive.

The First $1,000 Changes Everything

Your first $1,000 in profit changes your whole life. It shifts how you think, how your spouse thinks, how your friends think about what you’re doing.

You’re not some “shady dude doing crazy stuff out of his garage” anymore.

You actually made money.

Shannon’s goal for new members: Sell two items from your first pallet and get all your investment back.

Everything else is pure profit. That’s when the mental shift happens.

Start With What You Already Own

Shannon’s advice for complete beginners: don’t buy anything yet.

Walk around your house. Better yet, get your spouse to walk around and point out stuff you don’t need.

They’ll find things you haven’t touched in a year.

Sell that stuff on eBay first.

Learn the process:

• How does shipping work?
• What envelope or box do I need?
• USPS Priority Mail vs Priority Ground Service?
• How do I price things?

You don’t need to spend any money to learn. You just need to start.

Shipping Tips

Shannon never offers free shipping.

He thinks it’s a lie Amazon tricked everyone into believing (you’re paying $140/year for Prime, that “free shipping” isn’t free).

Instead: charge for shipping, offer free returns.

This doesn’t increase your return rate (stays about the same), but it solves customer problems.

When someone’s upset, telling them you’ll pay to ship it back immediately diffuses the situation.

Bonus: most of the time you don’t have to refund the original shipping when someone changes their mind.

The Seasonal Arbitrage Game

Want to know the best time to buy Christmas trees? January.

The best time to buy summer outdoor furniture?

October and November when stores are clearing it out.

The best time to buy exercise equipment?

December and early January when everyone’s returning their unused treadmills and Pelotons.

Buy off-season when nobody’s thinking about it, hold it for a few months, sell when demand peaks.

Simple arbitrage that most people miss because they’re not paying attention to the calendar.

Creating an Uncommon Life

Shannon’s whole philosophy boils down to this: he never wants to be told what to do.

Not in a rebellious teenager way, but in a “I want control over my time” way.

What An Uncommon Life Looks Like

• Flexibility to not have someone dictate your schedule
• The feeling that you created something from nothing
• Confidence that you can do it again if you have to
• Spending time with your family on your terms
• Living a “pre-tax lifestyle” by expensing business travel, research, and expenses
• What Shannon calls “Leave Me Alone Money” (not FU money, LMA money)

You don’t need to be the richest person in the room.

You need enough money that you can make your own decisions.

When your buddies at 50 years old are asking permission to take time off work to go wine tasting on a Wednesday, you realize how uncommon it actually is to control your own time.

The Noble Cause Evolution

Shannon’s noble cause has changed over the years.

When his kids were young: educating them, building a life with them, creating humans who don’t get plugged into the Matrix.

Now: helping other people become entrepreneurs through reselling.

He didn’t set out to be “the auction guy.” He just talked about auctions because that’s what he’s done his whole life.

Turns out it’s abnormal (who knew?), and everyone wants to learn.

His $5 Reseller Mastermind (almost 2,700 members now) has become bigger than just selling stuff.

People are losing weight because they’re grinding. They’re becoming better examples for their kids.

They’re not sitting on the couch every night, they’re in the garage rolling out rugs and figuring things out.

They’re becoming entrepreneurs without even realizing it because Shannon made it accessible: just start selling stuff from your closet.

The Mindset Shifts That Matter

Experiments, Not Commitments

Shannon frames everything as an experiment. This releases him from the pressure of guaranteed success.

“We’re trying a new experiment” sounds way different than “We’re doing this and it better work.”

It also gets buy-in from skeptical spouses, parents, and friends. You’re not quitting college to start a software company, you’re experimenting with learning to build an app. No pressure, just learning.

Talk About What You’ve Done, Not What You’re Going to Do

When Shannon was starting out, family members would give him grief: “Your poor wife, you don’t have a stable job, you’re jumping from business to business.”

So he stopped talking about his plans. He started talking about results.

When civilians (non-entrepreneurs) ask what he does: “I own small businesses.” That’s it.

When entrepreneurs ask: “How much time do you have? Let’s go down the rabbit hole.”

Small Systems With Quick Rewards

Don’t set massive goals five years out. Build small systems that give you feedback quickly.

Shannon’s always hunting for dopamine hits:

• How many views on that post?
• How many people joined the mastermind today?
• How many sales this week?

Make mistakes when they cost you $100, not $10,000. Build confidence with small wins.

Lose the doubt and imposter syndrome that holds everyone back.

The First Sale Changes Everything

John remembers it. Shannon remembers it. Everyone who’s started a business remembers their first sale.

It scratches that itch in your head that says “this normal path isn’t right for me.”

If you’re listening and you have that itch, that feeling that there’s more to life than the standard go-to-college-get-a-degree-buy-a-house path, you need to try.

Just sell one thing. Make one sale. See how it feels.

You can’t unsee what’s possible once you make that first sale.

The Bottom Line

You don’t need some revolutionary business idea. You don’t need a ton of capital.

You don’t even need to quit your job.

You need to:

1. Start with what you already own
2. Learn the basics of shipping and selling
3. Make your first sale
4. Buy your first small liquidation lot
5. Solve the problems that come up
6. Repeat

Companies are drowning in returns and excess inventory. They need to move it. You can buy it for pennies on the dollar and flip it for profit.

Shannon’s $5 mastermind has nearly 2,700 people learning this stuff together. They’re doing local meetups. They’re sharing wins and failures. They’re becoming entrepreneurs one $100 bill at a time.

The deals are there every single day. The question is: are you going to watch Netflix, or are you going to watch auctions?