More than 82,000 folks — 29,000 of whom declare to be Etsy sellers, based on two strike organizers — have signed a petition supporting sellers’ calls for that the corporate lower lately elevated vendor charges, amongst different vendor-proposed adjustments. Many sellers shut down their digital outlets for the previous week, importing banners on their pages noting that they had been on strike.
A gaggle of two women and 4 nonbinary folks organized the strike — largely over Reddit and the messaging app Discord, the place greater than 600 sellers have been in fixed contact, fielding media requests and strategizing next steps.
Two of the lead organizers and three sellers who took half within the strike advised The Washington Post that current coverage adjustments on the platform have reworked it from a refuge for marginalized folks in search of to begin their very own companies — together with many women, LGBTQ folks and folks with disabilities — into a spot that replicates among the real-world financial limitations these folks face in making an attempt to earn a residing wage.
“People see us as hobbyists, or crafters, or just people doing something on the side. … They don’t see what’s happening here is exploitation,” mentioned Mattie Boyd, 32, one of many lead organizers of the strike and a nonbinary Etsy vendor who mentioned they earn a full-time revenue on the positioning from promoting punk-inspired T-shirts and equipment geared towards queer and trans communities.
“People are willing to write off the plight of Etsy sellers because people don’t take us seriously, but the reality is we depend on the platform, a lot of us, to make a living,” they added.
Etsy has flaunted the truth that it attracts sellers who’ve been traditionally underrepresented as entrepreneurs. Last yr, Etsy chief government Josh Silverman appeared on CNN to debate the excessive variety of women who’re Etsy sellers, characterizing the platform as an “on-ramp for women all around the world.”
A 2021 Etsy report notes that the positioning has greater than 5.3 million lively sellers world wide, 32 % of whom depend on Etsy for his or her sole revenue. According to that report, 79 % of the positioning’s U.S. sellers are women. And 14 % of Etsy sellers establish as LGBTQIA+ — double the proportion of LGBTQIA+ folks within the U.S. inhabitants.
The Etsy report doesn’t measure the variety of sellers with disabilities, nor the intersections of sellers’ genders and races — although it notes that 76 % of Etsy sellers are White.
Etsy didn’t reply to repeated requests for remark from The Post.
Here’s a rundown of what led to the strike, what sellers wish to see change on the platform and what organizers are planning next.
The sellers’ petition outlines 5 calls for, two of which concern sellers’ charges.
Sellers are demanding that Etsy cancel the current improve within the transaction charges sellers pay on every buy, which the platform introduced in February would go from 5 % to six.5 %. That improve took impact final Monday, the primary day of the strike.
For Boyd, getting notified of the price hike was “the straw that broke the camel’s back,” they mentioned, including that “it came at a time when there were a lot of us [who] were really having issues with some other problems that have kind of been developing over the past few years.”
One of these boiling frustrations involved off-site advertisements, which the platform launched in 2020 and which promote gadgets bought on Etsy on search engines like google and social media websites. If a buyer clicks on one of many advertisements and makes a purchase order on the Etsy store inside 30 days, Etsy fees the vendor a minimal 12 % price on the order. Vendors who earn lower than $10,000 yearly on the positioning pay the next price — 15 % — however they will additionally decide out of the off-site advertisements. In their petition, the sellers name for all distributors to have the ability to decide out of such advertisements.
On prime of the transaction and off-site advert charges, Etsy sellers additionally pay varied different bills, together with delivery prices and an inventory price of 20 cents per merchandise. Other websites’ price buildings are usually extra variable than Etsy’s: eBay permits sellers to checklist as much as 250 gadgets at no cost, and fees a closing sale price that varies based mostly on the precise product, whereas Amazon fees 99 cents per itemizing for particular person sellers, or a $39.99 month-to-month subscription price for “professional” sellers with greater volumes, plus a referral price for every merchandise bought, which differs based mostly on the product, and a closing price of $1.80 on some merchandise.
For 39-year-old Rhode Island resident Kristi Cassidy, one of many strike organizers and an Etsy vendor since 2006 who earns a supplemental revenue on the positioning, Etsy’s price will increase have resulted in a few two-thirds lack of revenue since 2019.
“It’s gotten to the point where I don’t even make minimum wage anymore,” Cassidy mentioned.
Cassidy’s merchandise — custom-made costumes and wedding ceremony clothes — take her at the very least two weeks to make, she mentioned. That’s why she plans to pivot to doing most of her enterprise on her personal web site, as a result of she will be able to’t afford “a solid two weeks of making something for less pay” on Etsy, she mentioned.
Sellers’ different frustrations featured within the petition embrace an allegedly sluggish help system for sellers who attain out to the platform with customer support considerations; a “star seller” program that incentivizes quick buyer response and delivery instances, which sellers say aren’t all the time possible; and a proliferation of resellers, or “people buying stuff made in factories and tricking buyers into thinking they made it themselves,” Cassidy mentioned.
The strike’s lead organizers additionally despatched an e mail outlining their calls for final Monday to Silverman, the platform’s government workers and some members of its board of administrators, however they’ve but to obtain a reply, based on Boyd.
Why is Etsy so common amongst women and LGBTQ sellers?
Boyd attributes the higher-than-average charges of Etsy sellers who’re women and/or establish as LGBTQ to the truth that “Etsy really has historically been effective at lowering the bar” for aspiring entrepreneurs.
“I think it’s appealing — because some people face real barriers to accessing capital, or to whenever you need to open up a brick-and-mortar store — to build one’s own website. … I think for people who don’t have that as an option, [Etsy] becomes even more appealing, but also important,” Boyd mentioned.
Many women particularly mentioned they had been interested in the pliability and autonomy Etsy supplied, permitting them to steadiness paid work with youngster care.
That was the case for Cassidy: She has two autistic sons, ages 14 and 9, and Etsy has allowed her to “be the flexible [parent] that can make her own schedule” and handle her boys as wanted, she mentioned.
For Aida Almeraz, a 37-year-old vendor who lives in Hattiesburg, Miss., her Etsy store — the place she has bought custom-made canine collars since 2011 — has allowed her to supply for her 8-year-old son as a single mom, she mentioned.
Almeraz’s Etsy gross sales blew up between 2014 and 2016, and she continues to earn a full-time revenue from the positioning, she mentioned. But her gross sales have been steadily declining since 2019. Last yr, she earned $26,000 much less on the positioning than she did in 2018, her tax paperwork present.
Almeraz added that the platform’s fixed adjustments over the previous few years — together with the introduction of the star-seller program — have led to unrealistic expectations from clients: “When a customer expects to receive an item in three days and they don’t, they don’t attack Etsy, they attack me and my business,” she mentioned.
The Etsy sellers who had been on strike are nonetheless hammering out the main points of precisely what comes next, based on Boyd and Cassidy. But for now, one factor’s sure: They don’t intend to cease organizing although the strike is ending.
They as an alternative plan to kind a “solidarity organization … basically the equivalent of a union for Etsy sellers,” Cassidy mentioned.
“We will be, at the very least, a force for Etsy to reckon with before they try to do things to hurt us in the future. … The stronger we get, eventually they can’t keep ignoring us,” she added.
Sellers additionally plan to take particular person actions to protest the price hikes and adjustments to the platform if Etsy executives don’t reply to their calls for. For many, protest will come within the type of both migrating off the positioning — as Cassidy and Almeraz mentioned they plan to do — or begrudgingly growing the value of merchandise they carry on Etsy. Some sellers say they’ll encourage different aspiring entrepreneurs to remain off the positioning.
Hannah Forkel-Matte, 30, an Etsy vendor since 2015 who earns a supplemental revenue on the positioning promoting My Little Pony-themed stickers and equipment, mentioned mothers recurrently come to her for recommendation on beginning companies on Etsy.
Last yr, Forkel-Matte — who relies in Evansville, Ind., and has a 4-year-old daughter — began giving these mothers new recommendation, she mentioned: “If you want to build your business, I would consider doing it off of Etsy, just because I don’t know what the future holds.”