Hey everyone!
Youu might know that Etsy has gone terribly wrong these last weeks... and months.I just got a message form a very dear friend who saw her Etsy account closed.
They first e-mailed her to ask her proof that her things are handmade. She answered back and gave all the pictures she could within 24 hours. Still.
Account closed.
4 years are lost.
All her clients are lost.
All the feedback is lost.
AND Etsy was her main income.
She did handmade jewelry. You can see her work here.
I'd like to tell you that this is a first, but unfortunately it's not.
I know of 4 artisans friends who have been investigated by Etsy to check if they were resellers. I'm talking about small shops here that have less than 50 items and are clearly handmade.
Also, recently, Etsy went so far that they featured a reseller on the front page.
And I'm afraid to tell you that they are not breaking any of their rules by doing so, because "resellers" are easily put under the term "collective", which is (intently) very vague.
Now, this is what many of us think Etsy is doing right now:
They want to open their doors to resellers, because resellers sell a lot, thus Etsy is going to earn a lot. They even bought trunkt, a marketplace for wholesale...
So if you have an Etsy shop, please join protesty.com
We are going to close our shop on the 10th of May, as a form of silent protest.
We do not want Etsy to turn into a form of eBay.
We do not want Etsy to close real handmade shops.
We do not want Etsy to keep tons and tons of resellers.
We want Etsy to stay handmade. The real handmade.
Thanks for reading.
Stéphanie
23 Comments
I hope your voices are heard but fear reality will be otherwise....sadly .
ReplyDeleteThe only way to show etsy you disagree ist to stop selling there and start your own webshop.
True. But shouting is better than doing nothing :)
DeleteI totally agree!
DeleteIt's incredible...they can't do that...
ReplyDeletethis is horrible. :(
ReplyDeleteSuch a sad thing to happen :(
ReplyDeleteEtsy has forgotten that it was the small shop with unique handmade goods that brought buyers in the first place. And what about the latest news regarding multiple listings? The ones who will benefit most are the resellers with large quantities of the same item.
ReplyDeleteWhat the heck is Etsy doing? Their reputation is for handmades, your friend is clearly making these. Dang.
ReplyDeleteSo sad about this two faced acting these days by Etsy :(
ReplyDeleteThis is very upsetting, we don't need another ebay, as someone already said, it is the unique handmade goods that attracts buyers, lots of resellers will make buyers wary as they won't be certain what they are buying is genuinely handmade.
ReplyDeleteSadly happen to me too, Etsy close my shop for one week or more days and it just was because a misunderstand with a customer. Such a very sad experience with Etsy. www.kutz.etsy.com
ReplyDeletepas cool bon courage
ReplyDeletevous pouvez gagner contre Etsy
si c'est possible
Hi. I also make handmade goods. I am sad to learn about this. And here I am thinking of starting my own shop in Etsy. :(
ReplyDeleteChange of plans I guess...
Well you can try Dawanda, ArtFire, Zibbet, and you probably have some local handmade communities were you live.
DeleteALittleMarket is French for instance.
The best is to open shops in different venues.
Ce n'est vraiment pas juste, et je ne comprends pas bien quel est leur intérêt à fermer des comptes comme ça...
ReplyDeleteBah nous non plus. On comprend pourquoi ils veulent garder les revendeurs, mais fermer des petits magasins, ça nous dépasse :/
DeleteJe suis choquée et je ne comprends pas cette fermeture... On verra si notre action du 10 mai porte ses fruits mais je suis pessimiste :(
ReplyDeleteJe suis très triste de voir qu'il y a eu plusieurs cas de cette sorte. Je trouve cela très regrettable. Et moi qui voulais ouvrir une boutique..., maintenant je ne sais plus ce que je dois faire.
ReplyDeleteBravo pour alerter les bloggers et vouloir faire entendre votre voix. Il faut protester.
Geneviève
I wish everything is resolved in the best way possible and what is right is granted.
ReplyDeleteHugs
I sure hope etsy hear all the grumbling and takes action! I don't understand why they put so much effort in investigating these little shops. Maybe the solution would be to split the site into "handmade" and "everything else". Handmade was indeed what drew the buyers in in the first place.
ReplyDeletethanks for sharing this information. i feel like etsy has changed rapidly and dramatically over the past few years. and not in a good way. this is so discouraging to hear because the original concept was so great. it's awful that they're going after real handmade artists and ignoring crooked sellers. my personal pet peeve are sellers that translate patterns from japanese books and then sell them as their own. there may be a demand for it but that doesn't make it right!
ReplyDeleteHello Stephanie.
ReplyDeleteMy name is Renee and just last week, etsy closed my shop. I'm devastated. I've been a fan of your work for sometime on facebook and today I happened to visit your website/blog. I had to write. I currently have a blogger blog which I would love to integrate with a shopping site (much like your design). I'm having such problems trying to learn how to do this as I don't know the first thing about where to look for information. All my searches lead me to more and more confusion. I'm more than a bit lost. After seeing your site and how well it's done, I scrolled down to the bottom of your page and was a more that a little relieved to see that your website is also powered by blogger. Maybe this IS possible and there is hope for me too? I know this is asking a lot of someone you don't know anything about but I'm wondering if you can supply me with a little information about how you went about designing your blogger blog and also incorporated your shop into your site? Or, if you can recommend someone who I can contact, that can help me. Your design is so well done and it's an inspiration that maybe someday I can have something similar and will be able to continue my business without having to close my shop doors. If you can find the time to reply to me, my email is: info@kudoskitchenbyrenee.com and my blog is: www.kudoskitchenbyrenee.com
I thank you very much for any information you can supply me with. I honest and truly do enjoy your art. I have a major fondness for mini food items and yours are exquisite!
Thanks again!
Renee - Kudos Kitchen
Hi Renee!
DeleteSorry I didn't reply earlier, I'm a bit overwhelmed right now.
My blogger isn't integrated with my shop and website, they just share the same layout. So you switch from website to blog when you click on the tabs.
I used zencart for the shop, but I had a coder who did all the coding so everything would look alike.
So it all depends how much follower you have on blogger. If you don't have many, go to wordpress and make a website + blog + shop there, it seems to be easier. If you have too many followers, do the blog layout the same as on your website.
Good luck! :)
Stéphanie