How FigStead works

Every listing has a Save listing button. Saved listings collect under Saved listings in your account, and saving an auction is also how you get reminded before it ends — worth doing on anything you actually intend to bid on, because auctions do not wait for you.

Sold items shows completed sales and their final prices. This is the honest answer to “is this a fair price?” — asking prices tell you what sellers hope for, sold prices tell you what buyers paid.

1. Open the listing and find the bid box.
2. Enter the most you would pay in total for the item.
3. Press Place bid. You will be told immediately whether you are the high bidder or were outbid.

Being outbid instantly is normal and does not mean anything went wrong: it means someone already had a higher maximum in place before you arrived.

The minimum increment scales with price, so a $2,000 lot does not advance a nickel at a time. Cheap lots step by cents; expensive ones step by dollars. The next acceptable bid is always shown to you before you commit, so you never have to work it out yourself.

Some auctions have a reserve — a hidden minimum the seller will accept. The listing tells you whether a reserve exists and whether it has been met, but never what it is. If an auction ends below its reserve, there is no sale.

A bid placed in the final 10 seconds pushes the end time out by 60 seconds, and keeps doing so until the bidding settles. Sniping in the last instant does not work here, so you are free to bid your real maximum whenever you like rather than sitting on the page waiting to pounce.

Fixed-price listings have a Buy now button and no auction clock. Where a seller has several of something, you choose a quantity. First to pay gets it.

Some listings accept offers. Use Make an offer to propose a price; the seller can accept or decline. An accepted offer is binding on both sides, exactly like a winning bid, so do not offer a number you would rather not pay.

Checkout runs through Stripe or PayPal, depending on what the seller has set up. Your card details go straight to the processor — FigStead never sees or stores a card number.

A pickup order gets a confirmation code. The buyer is shown the code; the seller enters it at handover to mark the order collected. That way the record of collection comes from the person who actually received the plant.

Do not give the code out before you have the plant in your hands — it is the only proof of collection either of you has.

When a seller enters a tracking number, the order links straight to the carrier's own tracking page. FigStead detects the carrier from the number, so there is nothing to configure.

Once an order is complete you can rate the other party. Ratings are what the next buyer uses to judge a seller, so leaving an honest one is the main way this marketplace polices itself.

Before you can be paid you must complete onboarding with Stripe or PayPal, including their identity verification. Start this from account settings — do it before you list, not after you sell, because an unonboarded seller cannot receive money.

1. Go to Sell.
2. Photograph the actual plant you are selling — not a stock image, and not last year's tree.
3. Choose auction or fixed price. For an auction, set your starting price and, if you want a floor, a reserve.
4. Set your shipping cost, or offer local pickup, or both.

Listing is free. The selling fee is 0% until Mar 1, 2027, after which it is 2% of the item price — never of shipping. The card processor's own fee is separate and is theirs, not ours. The current rate is always shown to you while you list.

FigSteaddoesn't sell you a label — you buy your own postage, which keeps the money entirely between you and the carrier. The cheapest way to do that is a free label service like Pirate Ship, which charges no fee of any kind and gives you USPS commercial pricing — well under what the post office counter charges. Buy the label, then paste the tracking number into your sale here so the buyer is notified automatically.

On the sale page, Copy addressputs the buyer's full ship-to block on your clipboard so you can paste it straight in rather than retyping it.

You set one flat shipping cost, but the carrier charges you by distance — so the same parcel can cost noticeably more to the far coast than across town. The listing form has an estimator that shows you both ends of that range and suggests a figure that covers every destination.

Two things catch plant sellers out, and both are about box size rather than weight. A box over one cubic foot is billed on its size if that works out heavier than what it actually weighs — which is why a light potted plant in a big box can cost a surprising amount. And a box longer than 22 inches picks up an extra charge, with a bigger one past 30 inches. Packing tighter is usually the cheapest change you can make.

Anyone with an account can list, but the sellers we feature have been through a review of their track record. Apply to sell to be one of them — it takes about five minutes.

Turn it on from settings, especially if you sell. A seller account is a payout destination, and an account someone else can log into is a payout destination for them.

You can block another member from their profile or from a conversation. A block stops them bidding on your listings, buying from you, and opening conversations with you. It works in both directions, so you cannot buy from someone you have blocked either.

• Read the seller's ratings before you bid, not after you lose money.
• Check sold prices so you know what a variety actually goes for. Wildly cheap rare cuttings are the oldest trick there is.
• Keep the transaction on FigStead. Someone steering you to pay off-platform is removing your protections on purpose.
• Ask questions before bidding. A seller who will not answer a plain question about what they are selling has told you something.

1. Message the other party. Most problems are a misunderstanding.
2. Failing that, take it to whoever holds the money — your card issuer for a chargeback, or PayPal's dispute process.
3. If you believe you have been defrauded, that is a police matter and should be reported as one.

Report a problem on an order tells us about rule-breaking so we can remove bad actors. It is how you keep the site clean — it is not a refund request, and it does not open a claim. The full position is in the Terms of Service.