⌘ K

Etsy - Anyone else doin' it?

El Guapo · 2018-07-25T22:23:51.000Z

So I have been selling on Ebay for almost 18 years and on Amazon for about 7 years. Last year I decided to try my hand at Etsy, making Christmas Ornaments and selling them. Started in January of 2017 and sold a few here and there, but nothing significant. In July, I go on vacation but upon return forget to turn my "vacation mode" off (d'oh). Needless to say I am not getting any sales. I realize my mistake mid November - switch my store back on and then it literally explodes. Did about 8k in sales the last 45 days of the year!!! I had to bring in outside help (my wife and kids) to assist with making more ornaments and shipping...It was madness. So some notes on Etsy - 1) Has to be hand made or VINTAGE or be crafting materials. So old 80's toys definitely fall into the "vintage" category. 2) Fees have just been raised (there is outrage in the Etsy community) to a whopping 5% of sales + shipping. 3) Costs .20 cents to list, and listings last for 3 months. There is no "time remaining" like in ebay, but it is more "store centered" then say Amazon where everything is just sorted by price. 4) This is the best of all - the people there are genuinely NICE. My selling experience couldn't be more different then what it was like on ebay (Amazon, there is just little to no customer interaction). So I'd like to say that Etsy, as a company, is friendlier to sellers, but to be honest, I don't know! I had about 300 transactions last year, and other one customer who ordered by mistake, everything was smooth sailing. I guess my topic would be: Anyone else selling on Etsy? If so, what kind of experience have you had?