I'll admit it, I am cheap. When I went about setting up by home basement studio I went looking for bargains on eBay. I got a great deal on everything except the painted background. I was looking for and Old Master type background with a blue color.  Imagine my surprise when I found just what I was looking for. WOW the starting bid is only $.95, how could I loose. So I bid, hey I'm cheap but I bid $10 for the background. Imagine my surprise when I won the auction for a mere $5.95. Years ago when I worked at a photography studio I had first hand knowledge of what canvas backgrounds cost. We would buy new backgrounds every year from Denny Manufacturing . They were a few hundred dollars a piece back in the 80's.  

OK I go to pay. First off the seller demands $3.00 insurance, no way to opt out. Here is the kicker $40 shipping for the background. I think to myself, "that seems kinda steep". Just to ease my mind I cruise on over to Denny Manufacturing's web site and see how much they charge to ship a background. Guess what they charge the same thing $40. So I convince myself that it must cost a lot to ship a heavy canvas background in an oversize tube. I paid the the $43 shipping and ins. in good faith, Then I sat back and waited

About a week later a BOX showed up on my porch from a zip code in Texas. Gee what could this be, I said.  I quickly opened the box. I couldn't believe my eyes. These yahoos had taken the background off the tube and folded it over and over to make it fit in a smaller box! Then I glanced at the weight , 5lbs. How could a 8 x 10 foot canvas background weigh just 5lbs? Answer ..........When it is not really canvas, but some cheap light paper towel like fabric embossed to resemble canvas. The so-called hand painted background was air-brushed if not printed.

So here is my warning, go ahead and buy one of those 95 cent backgrounds from Texas, just be forewarned , These guys are making their money on the shipping. It cost less than $12 to ship my package. That means they made almost $33 pure profit because by charging so much for shipping they are avoiding paying eBay fees.   Hey eBay I thought Fee avoidance was against the rules. Maybe the rules do not apply to Power Sellers with over 4000 feedbacks. ....Oh yeah, their customer service says send it back.........but here is the catch my $43 for shipping and insurance is not refundable. So thanks boys, I won't be sending the evidence back. Yeah, I said evidence..........figure it out!

The sad thing is the backgrounds are not bad for cheap imitations. If they shipped them properly (in a tube) they might even be usable. I tried everything under the sun, those wrinkles from folding just won't come out, they might actually be worth 95 cents.