Re: I'm lost....kicked off Etsy
I cant emphasize too strongly that if selling online is your main or only income then you need to diversify. Sell on as many platforms as you can. I have 2 shops on Etsy, others on Ruby Lane, Ebay and DaWanda as well as my own website. So 6 shops in all.
There may be BIG money in brands and imitations but I have always steered clear of them except for true vintage items.
I too deal in antiques and vintage. 3 times I have had someone snitch that one of my items was not "vintage" and Etsy sent me a vague message that "one of more of the items in your shop" may not comply with our policies, leaving me to guestimate what the offending item was. Rather than simply specifying what the item was and asking me to remove it.
What way is that for a professional company to behave?
If you sell genuine antiques/vintage I recommend Ruby Lane. I opened a shop there just over a year ago and have done very well. I dont sell as much as I do on Etsy but the ticket prices are far higher and I keep it for my better class stock. There is quite a strict vetting process to get approved but once you do there is a real hands off attitude regarding the actual interaction between the buyer and seller. I once mistakenly listed an item someone reckoned was repo (havnt we all??) and they asked me very politely to remove it from my shop. We then had a very civilised exchange in which I was told "we are aware that many experienced merchants have been taken in by these items ...."
Etsy would just shut your shop and not allow for the fact that even highly experienced dealers can make mistakes. They assume its deliberate. Meantime the site is clogged with resellers and cheap tat from the orient.
If I said that on Etsy they would say I was being "racist" and denegrating oriental people.
Another time a prospective buyer tried to bargain in a very aggressive way that I wasnt comfortable with so I blocked her from my shop. She complained to Ruby Lane and they told her "This is a personal matter between you and the store owner and we cannot intervene. Merchants may refuse service with any member without giving a reason".
Etsy does not even have a "block a bad bidder" facility.
Best of all - Ruby Lane has no feedback system.
Last edited by biglouis999; 01-11-2014 at 04:48 AM.
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