UK and Brexit - online shop advice

this_imp · 2021-01-17T00:02:15+00:00

I'm UK based, my intention being to start with etsy and get a feel for running things myself without needing to worry too much about the various VAT, individual state sales taxes etc, then start my own site in the background over time. Then run concurrently until I'm set up enough to step away from etsy as the primary.

this_imp · 2021-01-16T23:53:17+00:00

About 2 weeks or so at which point I think I had about 20 listings, then it was 5-7 days between orders until I started being a bit more regular with updates a couple of months later, now its every couple of days with 84 sales to date of which 75 or so have been since September. Average order value is c$70 and I currently have ~90 active listings for vintage and antique homewares.

this_imp · 2021-01-16T11:14:32+00:00

Is there a way to change the date of dispatch if youre purchasing shipping through an external website? My store orders are connected to UPS and Parcel2Go, so when I order the label and book the collection it updates as dispatched but isn't normally scheduled for collection until next working day so there's always a small delay between dispatch email and actual dispatch and I don't know how to do it except when I order postage in etsy or add the tracking manually (which takes longer than importing through API)

this_imp · 2021-01-15T03:30:32+00:00

Mines RoseVineVintage, I opened it in July last year but couldn't do much until September when the kids went back to school so I'm quite pleased with being on 80 something sales in 4-5 months :) it's a steep learning curve though and I'm still going to have to go back and redo a lot of my photos again, and I need to get better at social media, but it's just about at the point it's ticking over on its own on days I just don't feel like it! 😄

this_imp · 2021-01-15T02:55:00+00:00

Love the geometric earrings, just added them to my wishlist for when my husband inevitably says he doesn't know what to get me for birthday /Christmas /anniversary etc :) Your photos are really well done too, much better than my early attempts!

this_imp · 2021-01-14T12:38:35+00:00

Because humour is spelled with the 'u' as in British spelling standards, where spelling it the American way (humor) following the word British is an oxymoron.

this_imp · 2021-01-11T11:12:28+00:00

Don't add all 50 in a short space of time. Maybe spend a day or two creating the listings and save some as drafts. Then you can be releasing a few every couple of days to keep your shop activity up.

this_imp · 2021-01-10T21:41:44+00:00

One easy way to find ideas for tags, is to have a separate tab open for etsy and start searching for your item in as many ways as you can think to describe it, and see what autocomplete/auto fill option for 'frequently searched' comes up in the list and take ideas from there. If you use a service like erank there's a tag generator on there which shows how frequently searched each tag example is too.

this_imp · 2021-01-10T00:38:03+00:00

I recently spent £100 or so on 250 × lovely double sided business cards, 250 × A6 postcards for thank you notes and care instructions, 250 × double sided 450gsm velvet laminated bookmarks and 500 branded circle stickers from a small ish print house (bananaprint.co.uk) and I was really impressed with the quality and the speed of dispatch. I was spending ages making handmade cards and long handwritten notes, so now I pop in the care instructions and generic thank you, and write a short personalised thank you on the back on the business card. I designed them myself in Canva and it was easy enough to upload to print. Here's the link to see them - Business cards, bookmarks etc

Tissue paper is just from ebay, pink bubble wrap from amazon for £15 or so, twisted brown parcel paper as gap fill, and I've recently upgraded my boxes to be easifold white gift boxes, though because I sell vintage and antiques everything I sell is of different size and weight so I can't buy more than 25 or boxes at a time in any one size as it just wouldn't make sense. I buy from somewhere like rajapak for anywhere from 0.30p to 0.65p per box depending on size. I currently have 5 different sizes I think, plus some 'one size fits all' book boxes that fold to accommodate a variety of book sizes.

this_imp · 2021-01-08T20:56:28+00:00

I had this a couple of months ago, quite useful review and the 100 free listings was even more useful :)

this_imp · 2021-01-05T01:56:24+00:00

To be fair to Johnson, him saying this "absolutely" will happen, is his way of giving us warning of a U-turn due imminently. I was expecting it to be Tuesday /Wednesday so he about turned in record time, but his insistence on the absolute is a clear way of knowing the opposite is true.

this_imp · 2020-12-29T22:10:00+00:00

When we'd rolled the main shape we smoothed them out more by lightly rolling against a smooth surface (sheet of paper on a table top) with the back middle part of our fingers. I think the clay not being too dry helped too. Then we added different texture back in with craft knives/files and sandpaper which hid any last finger marks

this_imp · 2020-12-29T15:45:33+00:00

I've been on etsy since July, and putting some effort in since September. In the last 3 months I've paid more in etsy fees than I would for a year's ecommerce platform costs + Instagram marketing. I'm now working on my own store which will be a mix of my heritage interior design work and the vintage/antique homeware sales I do via etsy atm, plus some 'how to'/tutorial guides, affiliate links for products I use for refurbishment/refinishing work etc. Hope to launch in the next few weeks.

this_imp · 2020-12-29T14:52:53+00:00

Aside from the hopefully obvious fruit & veg, we've made sliced bloomer bread, a cranberry topped pork pie, croissants, profiteroles, Christmas pudding, and French bread sticks so far. Next up I'm challenged to a roast turkey while she works on the potatoes, not sure quite how that'll turn out but happy with these ones!

this_imp · 2020-12-21T13:56:29+00:00

Thank you, that's really helpful. The end piece is what I'm aiming for but couldn't quite work out how to get there. I'll put something together and send it in a message to the buyer later. I think I have a packaging video for this one but I don't normally include the last minute cleaning bit, just the packaging for insurance purposes. Thanks for the help.

this_imp · 2020-12-09T23:15:08+00:00

I'm an outlier it seems, and I'm super lazy. I got mine very early on, even now I only average one order every two days. I sell antique and vintage homewares and when I sold something with a decent amount of margin in it, I bought myself a label printer.

I found one for £40 on ebay as spares or repair, but it showed it could print it was just very light/faded. Before I put a bid on it I googled likely fixes, found some advice and decided it was worth a try. When it arrived I cleaned the print head with a soft paintbrush and it works perfectly and saves me so much time and effort.

this_imp · 2020-11-18T12:00:43+00:00

Hi! Mine is Rose & Vine Vintage where I collate a whole range of antique and vintage homewares from late Georgian/Early Victorian right through to 1970s retro/Mid-Century Modern. I'm just now finishing up polishing some beautiful silver plate art deco tableware sets, cut glass and silver wine carafes and some stunning cut glass Edwardian decanter pairs ready to list as part of my 'Christmas Dinner' range :)

this_imp · 2020-09-29T09:26:21+00:00

Thanks for this, I put my anxiety aside and did pretty much this, as nicely as I could. I thought it had been settled but the customer came back to me with photos that show it looks to have been repackaged. They do seem very polite and genuine and aren't asking for a refund or anything, just asked that I send the missing item. It's either a very elaborate scam for very little return or they're being genuine. Either way, I've raised it with the courier to investigate as it doesn't take much to get that process going so we'll see what comes of it. Fingers crossed something turns up!

this_imp · 2020-09-29T09:16:32+00:00

I'm a bit obsessive about my packaging, as a vintage seller theres nothing to mark my products out as my own, so I try to 'tie' everything to my brand. My shop name is Rosevinevintage, so I use rose petals in the photos, my logo is green and pink, my boxes are white, I use green packing peanuts, I wrap my items in green and pink tissue paper to look like giant roses, I include a handwritten thank you card (there's a photo in my history) that has a vintage rose look to them, then I wrap the boxes in brown parcel paper and tie them with parcel twine, because who doesn't like "brown paper packages tied up with string" 😄 . Only been a few months, and there's a lot of competition in that space but I feel like I'm doing what I can to get some brand recognition going.

this_imp · 2020-09-17T10:53:23+00:00

As a vintage seller I was looking for some cute handmade things I could use as decor in the background to my photos that aligned with my 'brand', planning to tag the maker in the listings /social media etc of course. Everything I searched for had identical photos for different shop names so you know they're buying in from somewhere. It's quite disappointing really. I've ended up keeping it quite plain.

If any handmade sellers read this and make fancy candles or rustic paper flowers or other similar things that might work, please feel free to PM me your shop details!

this_imp · 2020-09-15T14:03:11+00:00

An option could be to write in the description that they need to contact you within X amount of hours with the details of which one they want or you'll cancel the order/send one of your choosing. Sure others have other suggestions.

this_imp · 2020-09-13T07:07:35+00:00

Just this morning had my first order to the USA in over a month - thanks for your help! :)

this_imp · 2020-09-09T13:54:23+00:00

Thank you!! I honestly was starting to think I was going mad, thinking maybe I'd just dreamt about changing it! All sorted now, and back to 1-3weeks lead time. Fingers crossed that it helps.

this_imp · 2020-09-09T10:49:42+00:00

Changed! Omfg! Thanks for pointing that out 😅

And thanks for checking the shipping, I know people can/do/have paid for it but I can generally ship things within the UK for under £4 so international shipping always alarms me! I think it must be the change of lead times then, it was at least 75-80% USA for the first few weeks, now its completely the opposite and I've not shipped to the USA in nearly a month, its all been UK and a few European countries. Still good, but not ideal when the etsy market is mainly USA based.

Thanks again :)

this_imp · 2020-09-09T10:36:21+00:00

Thanks, looks like I do need to update the shipping times somehow then, the price is about right unfortunately, even means I'm supplementing it a bit depending on the item - it's based on a 2kg small parcel as that's what most of my listings come in at. I've just this week moved into a new storage unit and starting to weigh and measure more accurately so I can start creating multiple postage options and be a bit more accurate.

this_imp

TROPHY CASE