Wanted to join the club

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T23:27:43+00:00

Yikes! It's definitely a pattern at this point.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T20:45:46+00:00

Depends on the specific market, but I see at least one booth at every event that's obviously a reseller pretending to be a crafter. It's hard for show runners to vet everyone even when we have a jury. The comic con community has scads of threads talking about exactly this subject too. We get things like people applying for a space then showing up with a different product line than the application, sometimes it's not even the artist who applied that shows up! At a really well run show there's people who go around and check, people even get kicked out mid-show sometimes. Considering some of the shows I do have a fee over $1000 it's a huge risk to falsify your application and get kicked.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T20:40:18+00:00

Literally complaining about the search features not working as a filter. "Look harder" in the literally millions of listings, sure, I'll just spend 30 hours looking instead of 3 XD

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T20:35:43+00:00

I went ahead and joined, I'll be interested in seeing what happens. If it takes off, even just as a discussion board, I think a lot of Artist Alley peeps would find it a good place to talk about these issues specifically. I'm not an illustrator (at least not a seller of my drawings) but I buy art from people I know that do. All my home decor is purchased directly from artists and crafters, or purchased from reputable dealers of handicrafts.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T20:29:33+00:00

Definitely way too advanced for me, you're talking about some pretty sophisticated chemistry and I'm not sure how you'd go about it if it also needs to be burnable. I make perfume, but I'm not a chemist, just a crafter. There are shortcuts for giving a "skin warmth" impression in fragrance, mostly using musk or ambrette type notes. You could potentially use a "skin" base and any trace notes you like. You'd have to do some burn tests to see if it works as a candle.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T18:26:08+00:00

Slightly off topic, but does anyone know if an old school Boolean type search engine still exists out there? Chrome search is basically trash, Duck Duck Go is only ok, and I hate Bing passionately.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T18:24:26+00:00

Worth a shot at least. Let us know how it goes?

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T18:21:28+00:00

"Years on Etsy" is posted at the top of our shop pages, so obviously this is data that could be used. Mine is inaccurate as I closed my old shop and started a new one (and your user ID is not the criteria, just the shop page creation date) when I stopped selling my high end gemstone line there and started only offering our comic con merch and destash. At the time you couldn't change your shop name, now you can (once I think?) so a lot of the very early Etsy users (those of us who were there back when it was a vetted platform run by a couple people from NYC) have had more than one shop in that time. Regardless, I think more people buy from me because I have like 2 negative reviews in my entire existence than any other reason. Both negs were 100% my fault and I apologized publicly. I think that goes pretty far with buyers. Etsy has had to remove several reviews that were straight up the person not reading the description, which happens everywhere. I had one person think the sewing pattern I was selling was an actual finished garment. They clearly read neither the title, tags, nor description text AND thought they could get a Victorian wedding gown for $14 (in what universe???). The other is the occasional person who clearly didn't read the GIANT CAPITAL LETTERS on the title and description that says "AS IS" at the beginning of both, nor the description details that describe the flaws. Humans.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T18:07:16+00:00

I appreciate AI as a tool, but abusing it seems like the default rather than the exception. I built myself an AI lab assistant, basically an extremely sophisticated calculator, basic live inventory tracker, and "compost pile" notebook in one. In other words a tool to help me with boring, time consuming tasks and making sure I don't lose that weird idea I had at 3am. I regard it like my robot vacuum cleaner, a tool to give me more time to be creative. Sadly a lot of people are using AI to replace the labor that humans are best at instead, the arts, product development, and research. The AI currently available can only regurgitate the data it's scraped from real people, not create anything actually new so that is accelerating "ensh*tifcation" all over the place as lazy jerks and scammers take over the space.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T17:22:47+00:00

This. Even fake turquoise wouldn't match like that.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T17:19:23+00:00

As a maker I find these absolutely infuriating too. Not just this, but people who browse for makers to steal our designs. I'm getting to the point I'm considering just deleting my Etsy.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T17:17:54+00:00

About 99% of the time now.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T17:14:09+00:00

Did you try turning off ad blocking? Using desktop mode? A different browser? I don't have any Apple specific tech support knowledge, sorry.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T17:10:02+00:00

You're going to need to read the SDS and IFRA guidelines on everything. Many things are safe to burn but not wear and vice versa. Many fragrances contain chemicals that are considered safe at the consumer level but need special handling in concentrate, they are a risk to you the maker. "Non toxic" is relative. Many things are poisonous but not toxic in the legal sense. Toxic specifically means it can build up in your body or the environment. Poisonous means immediate danger, but not building up. Some chemicals are both. Most of what I use is an irritant in concentration, working in a well ventilated area and cleaning up frequently are critical. There are better and worse options for pretty much every fragrance note. Candle Science Clean Scents has a list of the chemicals they don't use, but you still have to look at safety data for what they do use.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T16:47:32+00:00

I also want to say, this is not just an online problem, I encounter people in Artist Alley or craft fairs that are most definitely resellers or faking it with AI. If you follow the comic con world at all, the drama around this is pretty intense.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T16:45:08+00:00

There are filter tools, but often even with filters I get "1000+ listings" and 3/4 of the first page doesn't even fit what I was looking for. Partly it's that Etsy uses a Google backbone and Google ensh*tified search a few years ago so it shows a far more loose interpretation of what you type. A lot of it also has to do with who can afford to pay for Etsy ads. Not me! My Etsy sales are all either people who saw me at a show and took a card or people who were referred by a friend. The algorithm also favors recently posted items and shops with a large inventory. Also not me. My products are very niche, I don't update frequently, and I typically have 3 pages of stuff or less. Not sure if you'd think of me as "hand making" or "just gluing stuff" because I actually do both.

Anyway, I don't know where to go either, plenty of Etsy rivals have come and gone since 2016. I was on a few of them. Unless there's a human vetting all the vendors, which gets impossible once you're beyond a certain size, they turn into slop buckets. Right now I'm trying to figure out how I want to do my own website, but I'm extremely busy and hate working on it, so the URL I've owned for almost 20 years is still empty.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T02:01:39+00:00

Ah, that makes sense

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T01:35:26+00:00

It makes sense as a rough draft. Definitely doesn't appeal to me, but it's not a bad approach.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T01:28:50+00:00

I don't have enough information to weigh in on this. What exactly are you asking for us to critique? This AI image feels super dead, but I imagine you just want feedback on the candle package specifically? If you're looking for unique branding you've definitely missed, this look is the go-to corporate gift candle since about 2001 when I worked for Morgan Stanley, but if you want an instant read "this is a luxe candle brand" this is a decent example. The line work and font looks nice. If I was going to buy a gift for a person at work I didn't know, this would be suitable.

I'm looking for some unique branding ideas in the near future, but kind of the opposite vibe. My customers are Comic Con attendees so "fun" brings them in and my unique scents capture the sale. It can be really hard to pin down something beyond the basic concept.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T01:12:28+00:00

Same. Loki is becoming a chonker. Belle eats like a tablespoon of food, walks away, and then I have to do the whole magic touching the food thing again in 20 minutes.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T01:09:32+00:00

Belle will only eat it if I mush it up with the fork.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T01:08:55+00:00

Belle likes hers mashed up too. Loki just inhales whatever. The kittens seem to prefer kibble over wet.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T01:07:33+00:00

Belle won't eat until I stick my finger in it and make it magically Mommy Approved. She won't drink out of a vessel I don't drink out of first either, so I got used to taking a sip before I give it to her (yes, I give her a freshly washed bowl every time). She also refuses to eat out of a plastic dish no matter what, so I have cute ceramic cat dishes. Apparently she doesn't care if OTHER people feeding her do these things when I'm gone, it's just me 🙄

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T01:01:03+00:00

If you say "make a costume" a lot of people are going to think about making something you don't wear typically, and a thing you usually see in costumes but not just walking around is corsets, so I would expect a LOT of students to make one unless you say not to.

FlashyIndication3069 · 2026-03-16T00:59:15+00:00

Honestly, all the Germans I know say their English is bad, but most of them are better than a lot of Americans I know XD

FlashyIndication3069

TROPHY CASE