ebay Holiday Market in Downtown Toronto

ebay brought their shopping market outdoors in downtown Toronto for some holiday cheer! If you were near Bay and Bloor over the past weekend, you may have been treated to some yummy apple cider and popcorn while taking a look at some great gift suggestions for everyone on your list. One of the more notable items for me was the Angry Birds Star Wars fused game of Jenga.

Get ready to explain that one to Santa Claus, kids!

Or maybe Santa’s already played it? You just know that Santa product tests games and toys throughout the rest of the year!  Heck, you may have played against him on XBox LIVE at some point. 😉

Something that tickled me at the event, was ebay’s compelling shopping tool available at every themed stall…

QR codes. I love QR codes.  And it surprises me that to this day, not everyone knows what they are.   I can easily state that I’m addicted to them, and there were many to enjoy at this event so you could easily search ebay for the items you wanted right there.

Simply by scanning one of the 20 easily accessible QR codes (shown in the image above), I was directed to this beauty here:

So much *want*!  And it wasn’t the only item that came up in the scan.  Each QR scan creates a quick search of specific keyword(s), and brought up the most relevant items on my Android ebay mobile app within a matter of seconds.  Do you realise how easy holiday shopping could be if scanning a code could produce hundreds of similar options to choose from with one click?

Did I mention that I’m almost finished my holiday shopping already? *big grin*

After speaking briefly with ebay Canada’s Country Manager, Andrea Stairs, I also got a better perspective of how much Canada truly values ebay. I knew it was a household name, and had been for years, but did you know that Canadians spent over a Billion dollars on ebay shopping last year alone??

Way to go Canada! Potentially, that means you spent less on things you really needed/wanted. Or spent a bit more, but got those really awesome IT items that were sold out everywhere else for your family last year!

The Apple and Android apps no doubt played a part, as you could easily purchase those special items at any time (like on a bus, in a park, the possibilities are nearly endles… and I say “nearly”, ’cause you definitely wouldn’t app and drive, right? Right.)

This year, the cash-flow is as tight as ever for many of us, and with an auction/buy-now market out there that is always great for a good deal, I know I’ll be finishing up my shopping list here!