Viva Vintage: SkitterCats

Jan 23rd, 2013 | Etsy Spotlight, Viva Vintage

Suzy DuBois of SkitterCats and EarlyBirdSale is a seasoned vintage seller with over 10 years experience. She’s expanded her local business by selling difficult to find vintage prints on Etsy. I sat down with Suzy, after meeting her in the forums, to talk about the challenges of selling vintage and her advice for new Etsy sellers. ...

Etsy’s MailChimp Myth

Jan 20th, 2013 | Etsy Tips

Etsy sellers are in a state of confusion after Tuesday’s Seller Handbook blog post. In a featured comment, Tara implied that sellers could use MailChimp, an email marketing service, to add an ‘opt-in’ during checkout and contact buyers after the sale to follow up. Sadly, this tip is misleading at best. While this would be a ...

Undiscovered Treasures: Discovered

Jan 15th, 2013 | Etsy Spotlight, Undiscovered Treasures

I’ve featured new Etsy shops over the past two years with my series Undiscovered Treasures. This week, we checked in with some of the featured denizens to see how their shops have fared since they were featured on the site. Bucket O Bolts Scott Evans of BucketOBolts has sold more items in 2012 than he ...

USPS Shipping Calculator for 2013

Jan 14th, 2013 | Etsy Tips, Tools

The U.S. Postal Service raised shipping rates on January 27, 2013. If you’re using USPS to ship your Etsy orders, you’ll need to update your shipping prices. This is no small task – fortunately, we’ve created a tool that can help decipher the complex USPS rate tables. The shipping calculator below will spit out the ...

Understand the Java Exploit

Jan 11th, 2013 | Editorial

The Etsy forums lit up today with the news that a critical security hole (exploit) has been found in Java, a plugin installed with many browsers. Brittany asked me to explain what the security hole means and what you can do to defend yourself. Java is a technology akin to Flash that allows websites to do ...

Shop Local Colorado: Light a Fire

Jan 5th, 2013 | Etsy Spotlight, Shop Local Colorado

Frederick Doerpholz of Light a Fire is an artist and Colorado native who pushes the boundaries of ceramics with industrial-inspired designs. He creates and fires a dizzying array of cups, bowls, mugs, sculpture and other pieces in his studio in Denver. Frederick sat down to answer some questions about his art, process and history. You’ve ...

Friday’s Fast Five: Goal Setting for Etsy Sellers

Jan 4th, 2013 | Fast Five

With the new year comes new year’s resolutions. Setting goals at the beginning of the year helps the go-getter and procrastinator alike stay focused all year long. Goals set this time of year are often abandoned because they’re not SMART goals. SMART is an acronym that lays out five rules for goal setting – follow them ...

Santa’s Clothespin Reindeer

Dec 13th, 2012 | Craft Tutorials, Holiday

Santa’s Reindeer have never been so adorable. With a few craft supplies you can make Rudolph, Donner, Vixen and the rest of the gang in no time. I had leftover clothespins from my Easter Clothespin Bunnies and decided to create Rudolph for this year’s Christmas tree. I updated the standard clothespin reindeer, making it miniature ...

Signing Up for Direct Checkout

Dec 8th, 2012 | Editorial

Back in June, Etsy released Direct Checkout – which allows shop owners to accept credit cards and Etsy gift cards directly through their shops rather than diverting to PayPal. I disregarded the notices that Etsy posted encouraging sellers to sign up – my son was born earlier this year, so it was easy to convince ...

Jelly Bean Bracelets

Mar 1st, 2012 | Craft Tutorials

Jelly bean bracelets are a quick and fun craft project for the holidays. These are made with Easter in mind, but as you’ll see at the end of the post you can play with colors to make them appropriate for other holidays too! The bracelets can be stuffed into plastic eggs, used for color coding ...