Why etsy will fail

Complaints about Etsy selling out and leaving its original audience behind are nothing new. Particularly now that the site has to grow and answer to investors, the tension between supporting small businesses and making Etsy into a bigger business seems to be an endless battle.

The problem for sellers is they often have no other place to go. They can sell through their own online stores, advertise on Instagram, or take a crack at Amazon Handmade and eBay. But Etsy remains the go-to place for shoppers looking for crafty goods, and many have built their businesses around the platform.

If Etsy makes a change, they often have no choice but to go along for the ride. Subscribe to get the best Verge-approved tech deals of the week. Cookie banner We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from.

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Accessories Buying Guides How-tos Deals. Health Energy Environment. YouTube Instagram Adobe. Kickstarter Tumblr Art Club. Take your time styling, photographing, and editing the product photos for your Etsy shop. Read some of my photography tips and other ways to stand out on Etsy in this post! I recommend thinking like a buyer when creating your keyword strategy — what would someone searching for a product like your use?

Use multiple word phrases to create tags. You can add or change tags under the listing description on the editing page of an item. In the beginning, think of what questions a shopper could have and add them to the listing description. Bonus points for writing what inspired you to make the product or interesting information about your process!

Although your Etsy shop may not be a full blown business yet, if you never treat it that way — it never will be. A big part of growing the business is mindset and if you want your shop to eventually be more than a hobby, I encourage you to go in with intentions of growing it that way.

Things that fall under the hobby category: not opening a separate bank account, not telling your friends and family about your new venture, not putting in the work once your shop is set up.

Get serious from the beginning if you want to be an Etsy success! Be willing to get a little uncomfortable in order to take the next step in your biz journey. Did you find this post helpful? Learn how to audit your products, maximize your listings, get consistent sales, and grow your shop! Thanks so much for commenting, Emma!

So glad it was helpful. I loved buying from artists, knowing that what I was getting was from a well-established craftsperson. I had a shop myself and the worst discussions I remember having were artists who insisted prints were original art.

My roommate just bought some face masks from a seller that said they were hand made. When she got them, they were masks made in China. Great article Abby. This has been a year to really look at values. Let hope the handmade aspects of Etsy sellers will become valued once again. I agree that Etsy has very little incentive to remove resellers.

I believe they are no longer interested in brand integrity or brand loyalty and want to cash-grab as best they can. This is what happens, generally, when a company goes public and is not at all surprising.

It might be time for true handmade Etsy sellers to stop concerning ourselves with the unfairness of competing with resellers, accept it, and develop new strategies to reach the buyers that do wake up and say, I want something handmade or at least something that is not mass produced.

I know I have customers that do this. This is a tough shift. Thank you Abby- well said and expressed. Yes Mr. Silverman and the shareholders have taken something very special away from Etsy and what it once represented. Now Etsy is creating just an amalgam of mediocrity. Yes buying habits are based on what people need but with the current mindset of Etsy, they are removing the choice or making it more difficult to recognize of a Buyer to be able to select handmade or better quality or the unusual goods.

Stacey makes a valid point- why would you buy on Etsy when you can get the same on Amazon, Target, Ebay, Wish etc etc-and — why would you be loyal to Etsy as a Seller if you can get better selling results on the same product elsewhere! There is an old saying — If you lose your way go back to where you started and for Etsy this should be focusing on handmade, quality, special, individual, unique, OOAK, made with love, personalized, customized, made to measure, capturing the niches and top end quality goods.

Almost forgot- and the same for vintage goods. Why be like other selling platforms- they are all the same……. So much this. Currently, it seems Etsy is happy to take the listing fees and such from small shops, regardless of their selling success.

The shift is distressing, to say the least. Even then, resellers would circumvent it somehow. Amen to this. Such a shame. I rarely go to Etsy anymore. I only ever head there if I have a specific seller in mind that I found elsewhere, usually on Instagram, or have been purchasing from for years. Not any more. I refuse to spend hours digging through repetitive listings of mass produced product.

How boring he must be. I bet his home is full of wall art. Thanks Abby Glassenberg for the heads up on these people. You have saved many from getting ripped off.

Something all too prevalent these days. Etsy was founded to make money. Its a business and if sales are slumping because people are not buying what your offering its time to rethink your platform, as in any business. I read so many post about knocking etsy and resellers, if the customer is happy with the item they found and bought.

I look around at sellers and so many still have great years in numbers. Thank you, Abby, for an excellent article. I continue on the platform because I have loyal customers that, thankfully, keep returning.

Great article , totally agree. I encountered this firsthand when someone else listed on Etsy, a product I created and sold on Amazon. I spoke to representatives, but Etsy will not remove the listing. Oh this article hits close to home. I had an Etsy site years ago when it was supposed to be handmade but then started seeing more and more manufactured things.

I also had 6 stores within mile radius of my home that I rented space in that made me sign a contract that everything I sold was made by me. Then I started seeing things in there that were the same being sold at Hobby Lobby in one store. When I brought it to the managers attention, she said the person swore she made them herself. Shortly after, they changed their rules to include Handmades by others. Of course I could not compete price wise. I rarely ever do searches anymore, because of all of the obviously mass-manufactured dross that comes up.

As a maker and consumer! Excellent article! From Sept-Dec, I sold thousands of felt masked gingerbread ornaments that I was able to produce quickly on my embroidery machine. This article does a good job of explaining how pariahs are watering down what makes Etsy special. I do feel like a distinction needs to be made between resellers and people who sell supplies for crafting and art. I sell quilt patterns created by independent designers with their permission and quilt fabric that I am licensed to resale.

I consider my shop an online quilt shop, but I can see how it might be confused with one of these shops that is just flipping stuff. Kudos to you for being an early joiner on Etsy. I miss some of the early features like Pounce to discover new listings and the public Treasuries. You yourself sell eyes for stuffed animals. Are they all handmade? I also sell things that fall under the vintage category that Etsy used to tout but now rarely highlights.

Vintage fabric and patterns can be considered both supplies and collectibles. Thanks Rose. I am a supplies seller on Etsy. I sell digital sewing patterns and supplies to make stuffed animals and dolls including safety eyes. These are in the supplies category, not the handmade category. We need a business entrepreneur to create a new site for strictly handmade. Who has the money and gumption?

You should take a look at goimagine. They have created a marketplace for handmade sellers. They went live August And a bonus, the company profits go to Charity. Am I understanding correctly that in order to sell there I would need to never follow a pattern, except one you design? I agree Etsy does need some healthy competition. I have noticed in recent days that there are many venture capitalists and entrepreneurs who are investing millions in social media and other startups like Gab, Parler, Telegram, etc.

It seems to me that there is a huge demand for quality vintage and handmade items as well as hundreds of thousands if not more talented artisans to supply that demand. Etsy has always been my hobby. That being said, this has been my worst year in history. I still believe that there is quite a bit of money to be made by the right person who sees what a big money maker Etsy is and decides to jump in.

I sure would be a customer. Bravo, Abby!! I am a seller of leather goods on Etsy for 13 years, a once exceptional place to sell handmade goods, and have survived the pitfalls of constant change. My success was, from the onset, personalized, custom handmade items and it worked great for us until the company went public.

Now that they have shareholders to be accountable to people like Silverman push the envelope. Free shipping was the start for us. I only list a few things with free shipping to draw buyers to our shop. Then it was the nickel and diming away my earnings. I am still fortunate enough to be selling our goods, but I can see in time our demise. Thank you so much for writing this accurate depiction of the life of Etsy. So sad it is coming to this. I sold an item. In the financial section of my page I read three deductions under taxes and fees: 1.

When I sell a high ticket item their take, naturally, is higher. If I refund for shipping overcharges, which I do, there is a fee for that. So please, forgive me if I agree to disagree with you. Etsy does not charge for shipping overcharges or cancelling an order. Since they charge their fee on what you charge for shipping, when I refund shipping overages, Etsy gives me a fee refund.

There are NO fees for the shipping labels purchased through Etsy. I have had an Etsy shop since and It is profitable. This includes the listing fee, the transaction fee, and the payment processing fees. If you purchase your shipping labels through Etsy, then you will also be charged for the exact amount of the shipping you have purchased.

If you do not purchase through Etsy, you have to buy your shipping from somewhere. This is not an additional fee, unless you deliver your items yourself or your customer is picking it up from you, shipping is something you have to pay for. Sales taxes and VAT are added on to the sale at checkout. This never impacts the price of your item or your profits. Etsy charges these fees to the customer and then takes them out immediately to pay the proper agencies.

It was the best! I thought Etsy was supposed to be handmade, handcrafted. If the owner just got a NINE million bonus, is he really doing his job? Such an excellent article. If there was a viable alternative I would abandon Etsy in a hot minute and never look back. One closed her shop because of it. Thanks for another great article! Such a well written, to the point article, stating things exactly as they are. Ive tried a few other platforms with not much success.

Etsy became just another marketplace when they stopped policing resellers and allowed mass producers and production partners. This is Spot On. It is not a good business model any longer.

My items are labor intensive handmade and their is to much junk from overseas. Really good article, and sadly so true…I have to say though, having been a true handmade seller on Etsy from the start, my business has continued to grow year on year.

I do still seem to be increasingly visible to the more discerning customer…. Etsy has become just another online selling outlet. After all. Everyone ordered more online than ever last year because they were cooped up in their homes and afraid to go out shopping.

I seriously want to thank you for writing this! I am one of the real hand made everything shops! And I wish so much that Etsy was what it says it is. I might actually make some money and Etsy would, too! Fantastic article! As a vintage seller, sometimes the only way to tell the item is from China at first glance, is the gold foil sticker Made in China.

Buyer beware on both ends of the spectrum. The problem with Etsy is they make it far to easy to open a shop, If they vetted the shops upon application this could all be stopped. If they had a team of staff dedicated to approving shops before they go live then all this would be picked up on and applications could be denied.

Other sites can do this so it is possible. Etsy stopped removing most listings or entire shops for reselling during Summer It is no longer possible to know how many items are for sale on Etsy since the numbers shown include ads.

But I guestimate that more than half of the listings on Etsy should not be there according to the rules published on the site.

It amazes me to see Etsy shop owners in the Forums and even here writing of the reselling issue as if it is something that will dominate the site sometime in the future. That future is happening right now. So, you either learn to live with the changes or you leave. Truth be told, they cannot match the number of people that buy from Etsy.

I agree completely. Having been an Etsy seller since , I have seen the reselling get out of control. Silverman is too focused on those personlized, unique items for you and your home. Unique was once upon a time a buzz word of Pier One. Where are they now??? Etsy will eventually follow in those footsteps sooner rather than later, because they do not know who they are.