Etsy

[LancsRick]

Has anyone ever looked on Etsy at the various wooden products available? I've just been having a look and some of he prices on there seem extremely lucrative, and the number of reviews suggests that they do in fact sell. I'll admit, I'm tempted to make a few simple pieces and try it out for myself. Has anyone on here tried exploring this market?

 

[NazNomad]

Most of my 'ideas' are stolen from Etsy listings... Stuff seems to fetch crazy prices on there.

No idea what their selling fees are like though.

 

[LancsRick]

20p to list and 3.5percent take.

 

[Alexam]

I have used Etsy for a while now and don't really push the selling side as much as it can be pushed. However, I enjoy my hobby of making bandsaw boxes in my retirement but it is never a money making situation. The returns help to cover some of the cost of materials. Charges for listing are very reasonable and sale commission very low. I put together a modest Web site using Wix and never having done anything like that before, found it not too difficult. If you go to the Wix site, it will explain in more dtail.

If you want to make money you need to have a good dela of skill and make furniture of quqlity, which I am not able to do. I only took up woodwork about 4 years ago but do have fun.

Hope that helps
Malcolm

 

[marcros]

do you sell much through it Malcolm, or just a few bits here and there?

Not related to Malcolm's products in any way...

I have not looked in detail, but I have found the opposite of LancsRick- the prices seem too cheap to be viable, unless you have something that is not directly comparable. (Malcolm's boxes probably fall into the latter category)

Taking a search for an oak pen. I know a bit more about pens than I do about other items, but I am sure that there are similar examples with other products. There is 24 pages, each of 40 odd products. This includes some that are just blanks, and no doubt other that are not relevant to buying a pen. There is a lot of competition. The cheapest ones on there are modelled around a slimline pen- there is probably £3.50 of materials in these, and 3/4 to 1 hour of time. There is somebody selling them at £8. another seller at £10. That is on the first page, and I doubt that anybody searching for an oak pen would bother going beyond page 2 or 3. The quality of the turning doesn't look great, but the general public probably don't know where to look to see this- only after turning a few do you know how it should look.

Another example listed on that page is an omega pen. A £7 kit (excluding a share of postage from the supplier), plus a box (£1), bit of finish and wax, bit of sandpaper (another £2), best part of an hours labour. Selling price £15.

Even if I turn slowly, and there is only half an hour drilling, squaring, turning, assembling, buffing etc I could not make it pay. I would rather make them as gifts than work for nothing.

There is one seller on the first page that seems to be selling a good product at what I consider to be the right retail price. Member since 2016, no sales. This is selling a pen with a cost to the maker of approx £30 (including a margin for the maker) for in the region of £60, which represents the margin that a retailer/gallery would take.

I like the idea of easy, but I think in many cases, it makes a commodity of hand crafted items, and drives the price down to the lowest point possible- below economical break even.

Another point is that Easy could also ruin the opportunity for selling through a retail outlet- if you are offering the same product directly to the public at half the price of the gallery, it is going to be a short relationship with the retailer!

 

[thetyreman]

it's a place where people look but rarely buy, I haven't managed to sell anything yet, not sure if I am going to continue with it much longer.

 

[Leon1984]

I have just bought a coffee table off Etsy, it gets delivered Wednesday. It was £250, customer size and paint colour of my choice (base, legs) and natural wood finish. This was a delivered by a man in a van. I can't fathom how it makes money.

Interested to see what it is like!

 

[hawkeyefxr]

I wonder what the ratio of for sale and sold is. I look on Etsy sometimes for inspiration, i get bogged down when trying to think of shapes.

 

[Tasky]

I'm here because I looked at some things on Etsy and decided I could make something similar, but to my exact requirements...

 

[Leon1984]

it's a place where people look but rarely buy, I haven't managed to sell anything yet, not sure if I am going to continue with it much longer.

A few items I had my eye on had sold and been taken off, and given I was only looking at a tiny amount I would say things sell well on there.

 

[thetyreman]

it's a place where people look but rarely buy, I haven't managed to sell anything yet, not sure if I am going to continue with it much longer.

A few items I had my eye on had sold and been taken off, and given I was only looking at a tiny amount I would say things sell well on there.

I hope you enjoy your coffee table, I'm sure some things do sell well on there, I just wanted to give a realistic picture and tell it like it is.

 

[transatlantic]

I think one of the problems you have to first overcome is postage and packaging. Unless you're selling very small items, its going to be a bit of a ball ache.

it's a place where people look but rarely buy, I haven't managed to sell anything yet, not sure if I am going to continue with it much longer.

A few items I had my eye on had sold and been taken off, and given I was only looking at a tiny amount I would say things sell well on there.

I hope you enjoy your coffee table, I'm sure some things do sell well on there, I just wanted to give a realistic picture and tell it like it is.

With all due respect - I think your prices are very high, which is probably putting people off.

 

[dickm]

It seems to do tolerably well for my daughter's jewellry business, but that tallies with the view that it's best for small, easily posted items. We have to act as her UK agents for regular lines and have a small stock of these which we make up to order. Otherwise freight from USA is a total killer.

 

[Leon1984]

Arrived today. Nice chap in a van, family run business based in Sheffield (fair way from Bedfordshire). He had dropped off something local and had 4 other drops in west London for the day.

This was £250 delivered, with base painted any F&B colour we wanted. It happened to be perfect size for our kitchen snug area but could have customised a bit if we wanted. A bargain I think.

 

[Alexam]

Sales have varied from time to time. There are ways to promote your site, but I rarely bother as I have a hobby not a business, so don't push it. Some months I can sell 8-10 and other months nothing. I tend to do a sale one a year in November and offer a 20% discount, which makes several sales for Christmas. It depends what you want. I have also bought several items from other on Etsy.

It's not expensive so give it a try.
Malcolm