11/12/2024
Goodbye Etsy.
Over the next few weeks I will be closing my Etsy shop and moving all of my jewellery onto a different platform (likely Vinted). This is for two reasons:
1. The seller fees are simply too high to make a profit unless I price my items at unfairly high prices. I've always wanted my prices to accurately reflect the hours of work and the materials I put into each piece, not the need to give half of my earnings to a platform. I feel awful charging the people who support my very small business £10 or £15 more than needed just so we can both shove money into the pockets of millionaires. The sheer amount of fees charged by Etsy is so ridiculous that I wholeheartedly admit, I don't even know what half of them are for. I don't want me and my customers paying "whatcha gonna do?" fees.
2. My values don't align with what Etsy has become. Back when I opened my shop in 2015, Etsy used to be a great place to find unique handmade and vintage items. My business thrived there for years and I am eternally grateful to those who supported me there. However, in recent years the platform has been overtaken by mass-produced items parading as handmade, a lot of them sadly featuring stolen / AI artwork. This has gone on for too long for me to believe that Etsy acknowledge the problem and are doing anything to tackle it. Handmade and vintage traders who have been giving their hard earned money to the platform for years have been pushed into the background. Those of us who were once the whole point of Etsy's existence are now hidden somewhere on page 10 of search results, among mass-produced items. I will not stand for it any more until real change is made.
This is by no means a goodbye from Wire Witchcraft - I love what I do too much to ever give it up because of a greedy selling platform :) I will keep you all updated about the future of the business. In the meantime, I have temporarily uploaded most of my jewellery to my personal Vinted store, so if you're going to be a darling and order something from me, I highly encourage you to do it there. You will only pay a small fee and the shipping cost as the buyer, which still is nothing compared to what you would have paid on my Etsy shop. Here's the link:
https://www.vinted.co.uk/member/83143028-fluffykittenofdeath
I could use your support now more than ever - I will be more than grateful if you could please share this post on Facebook to make everyone aware of the issues that small online sellers face and help me support myself before Christmas.
Lots of love,
Emily x
