An important cost of barter that many people (including myself) forget to factor in is the time that I spend on it. It takes a lot of time to put a deal together. If you are like me, you’ve usually got 20 deals going at the same time so it really ads up. Some of the things that I spend time on include:
- Staying on top of what is available in my barter exchanges
- Calling on folks in my barter network to put together deals
- Posting to craigslist and following up on responses
- Work to recruit new members into my barter exchanges
- Work recruiting new direct barter partners
- Time spent looking for good ways for my barter partners to spend credit they have with me
- Extra book-keeping to keep the records straight
- Ongoing help/training I give to everyone I ever talk to about barter
When recruiting a new barter partner I think it’s a good move to point out to the prospect that you are talking to that barter is not as simple as cash transactions. They need to know that they will need to invest some time into barter in order to reap the rewards. All of that being said, it truly is a labor of love for me. <grin> I’m a barter addict and it rare for me to resent the time I spend on it.
Barterfanatic.com 
One thought on “It takes time to barter”