Feb 23, 2009 10:51 pm US/Central
Growth Of Crafty Businesses During Rough Economy
(WCCO)
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Etsy sellers join user groups called Street Teams. Members of the Minnesota team talk to each other about their stores, their sales and almost anything else.
CBS
Sometimes it seems like everything is mass-produced, but a fast-growing Web site is proof that's not the case.
Etsy.com got its start in 2005 when Rob Kalin, a 20-something New Yorker, couldn't find a place to sell the stuff he made.
Since the Web site went live, its sales have skyrocketed -- $3.8 million in 2006, $26 million in 2007 and $88 million last year. And its January sales more than doubled last year's.
Etsy takes 3.5 percent of every sale and charges 20 cents per listing. In addition to handmade, people sell supplies and vintage items on the site.
Around 5600 Minnesota artists sell their creations on the site. Jen Swift, a stay-at-home mother in Plymouth, is one of them. Her Etsy seller name is "Bird from a Wire". Bird on a wire was already taken. With her 4-year-old son on her lap, she stitches together fabric leaves and attaches them to a lamp shade.
"Do you think we should sell this lamp or should we keep it?" she asks Jasper.
"Keep the lamp," her son tells her.
Swift has come a long way since becoming an Etsy seller last summer. She said she used to have a hard time even showing her work to people. Now she ships it all over the world.
"You take it to the post office, and you're writing Singapore on it," she said. "Crossing that many miles halfway around the globe to get to someone else is really kind of inspiring."
What's the appeal of Etsy?
"The first thing is the love of crafting and the second thing is the desire to sell and make money off of what you love," explained Lori Shimer.
She edits
Craftster.org from her St. Paul living room. Craftster is a Web forum with 170,000 members.
"It's like having a big international network of crafty friends," Shimer said with a laugh.
Shimer believes handmade is hot for a few different reasons -- the urge to make something, disenchantment with consumer culture and the lousy economy, which makes a financial case for doing-it-yourself.
Of course, there's the handmade stuff itself.
"There's so many beautiful things," she said. "I do have an Etsy shop myself, but I think I buy way more than I sell."
Since WCCO's Maya Nishikawa started knitting a few years ago, she's come to appreciate the time and talent that goes into handmade goods. Her friends at Knit Night at Borealis Knits in St. Paul do, too. That's why they shop on Etsy. They also like supporting artists.
That's part of the reason Etsy is successful. It connects people who like to make stuff with other people just like them.
Swift explains that Etsy can be a mutual admiration society.
"If I see something I like, I'll just quick email the other artist and say, 'Hey, I love your work,' and I've met a lot of people just by doing that," she said.
Etsy sellers join user groups called Street Teams. Members of the Minnesota team talk to each other about their stores, their sales and almost anything else.
For people who feel strongly about buying local, Etsy has a geo-locator. Buyers type in their zip codes and get listings of artists in their own communities.
"There's a whole craft movement out there right now. I've heard it called an uprising even, you know, if you really want to get right down to it," said Samantha Hagel. She's the co-owner of
Truly…, a shop in White Bear Lake.
"You know, you hear about indie movies, and indie film, and we wanted to be an indie retailer," said Hagel.
The sign out front of her shop sums up that philosophy -- "Shop indie goodness."
"We look for things that you don't see everywhere, you're not gonna find at all the other stores," said Hagel. Like Etsy, the Truly... crew wants to help people make crafts, not just buy them. That's why the shop now has a DIY (Do-It-Yourself) lounge.
"We all are crafty and creative, and so we're really working to make sure that people can have a place to do all of that," said Hagel.
Truly...'s other owner, Sherrie Chapin, sells jewelry on Etsy under the name Blue Moon Jewelry, but she admits she doesn't sell much. Part of the reason is that she doesn't update her listings very often.
"When somebody does a search, it goes by recently listed, so I'm probably way on the bottom of the 28th page or something," said Chapin.
With more than 200,000 sellers, Etsy offers one big community for the arts and crafts crowd, and some decent deals for its customers.
According to Swift, the metal-and-fabric artist, "A lot of competition means some pretty unique artwork is going for pretty cheap."
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