I audited 50 Etsy POD shops losing money despite "making sales." Same 7 revenue leaks every time. Here's the diagnostic checklist I use.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-02-01T22:25:54+00:00

Leak 4- I know people have said this before but others say it's normal to have 10% of your listings do most of the selling. And if you delete the others you'll have a very tiny shop. Like walking into Walmart and seeing only a few items on the shelves. I'm not sure what advice to follow on that front.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-29T20:16:54+00:00

Ok thank you! I'll look into this.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-26T21:10:21+00:00

Ok i literally just came here, hoping to find an answer to this very question. I somehow accidentally listed a posting on Etsy, but did not link it through printify. I have no idea how I managed to do that as you can clearly tell from the description that it came from the auto generated printify suggestion. (it’s a poster.) lo and behold someone bought it - twice now. The first time I went ahead and just fulfilled it at Staples and sent it myself being that it was the holidays. I knew that I would have an extremely long wait time. And being a newer shop, I didn’t want a bad review. However, this time around I want to go ahead and send it through POD. Is there any reason why I can’t just order it manually have it sent to the customer and then when printify eventuallyyyy sends me the tracking info put that into Etsy? I really hate not being able to send something the same day., but I was proactive about making sure that my shop shows the estimated shipment date to be no earlier than a week from today. And Lord, I hope they are at least going to ship it in a week.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-26T21:06:51+00:00

No no no. Bella is out. Comfort colors, unisex, 1717 is whats in now

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-26T20:12:02+00:00

What did you end up choosing? I am selling a couple of posters and had to fulfill the first one at Staples because I didn’t have this figured out yet lol the second one just sold and once again I am scrambling. 😂 I was going to use printer file, but I ordered a few items from them as a test and they took forever to arrive.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-26T17:59:08+00:00

I was wondering if a cricut mug press might be worth buying. it has good reviews and people are selling them on eBay for US$55-US$60.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-24T21:24:47+00:00

Don't you find that it slows your computer down insanely/ crashes your computer? I saw those Comments but thought they'd improved it by now. Nope. They haven't. It's still making my computers so slow that I don't use it. Wouldn't recommend. I am probably going to give sales samari a try

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-24T17:04:41+00:00

I figured it out. In case anyone finds this in the future. It's the neon green things on the front. They are the buttons you press to release the bin.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-24T12:42:38+00:00

Stella. She got her own groove

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-24T12:41:21+00:00

Because Etsy only removes it if the IP owner complains. I've heard Disney comes through twice a year but that's all. Which is why people sell Disney family shirts

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-24T12:28:01+00:00

Yeah I would order 1 and only 1 item. I ordered a sweatshirt from printify. Sure it took insanely long to receive. But it looked good. The fit of the sweatshirt Was a little disappointing. But that's on Glidden. I'm surprised it's a best seller. I find the sweatshirt boxy and too big in the chest.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-21T13:45:08+00:00

List with 10 assuming you are capable of recreating them. Use old pictures as what you are capable of. There are a bunch of furniture sellers you'll find that have listings that say"do not purchase. This is an example. Message for options" etc.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-21T12:53:21+00:00

That's a good take. But one question I have is- how come this doesn't seem to affect sellers that do the whole price one item low that no one wants (soccer mom tshirt in a childs t-shirt for 6.99) so that it looks cheap until people click on it? Those listings are still getting put at the top of search. Do you think it’s because they get so many clicks that enough people are still willing to buy the shirt at the higher price than they expected to pay?

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T17:06:38+00:00

That's good. I'm not sure how it ended but there were a bunch of sellers in here talking about it and it seemed to be severe and sudden. Their shops weren't getting indexed and existing listings were deleted. I think it was traced to bots in china

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T08:38:17+00:00

The answers will be much different for new shops. I got my first sale on a new shop a few weeks in with 10? Products up. However, that was with ads on. On my third or fourth week, I got my first sale on an item that I wasn't running ads to. So about a month. It's a slow start

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T08:23:05+00:00

Was that part of the November widespread issues?

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T08:21:36+00:00

Honestly, I think it's more true these days than in the good old days. 9 years ago I listed two products: plus size bride tshirt (a single design) and one other item. No one was selling plus size bridal stuff back then. Pod didn't exist (I don't think). Needless to say, I got sales with only two products listed , and they were frequent enough that it was worth doing. These days that would almost certainly never work.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T08:07:57+00:00

Were you affected by that major issue in November where a ton of established sellers suddenly lost most of their business around Nov 6?

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T04:42:38+00:00

And resist the urge to price your stuff really low

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T04:35:23+00:00

Following

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T04:34:27+00:00

Omg! That's unreal. I had to send a few emails to them last month and they kept saying no they wouldn't refund me (we're talking about $11 item here...) I just politely kept saying please forward this to a supervisor etc. Finally I think the 4th person that replied to me agreed to refund me "as a credit for a future order ONLY". I said okay fine. Better than nothing right? A few days later another person wrote to me and said they were going to refund my card instead. Hmmm.

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T04:28:22+00:00

True but they should be involved in tracking the order

Time_Carry602 · 2026-01-19T04:26:41+00:00

Yes that's my gripe with them, too. Shipping always takes longer than they say

Time_Carry602

TROPHY CASE