06/02/2026
Back in 2016, we were banned from ETSY.
In the past 2 years, alot of 3rd party platforms have shifted in their operations. ETSY has shifted from its origins of "handmade" products and has allowed foreign sellers on their platform. It is essentially going the route of Amazon.
Speaking of Amazon, they are not well since the Covid pandemic ended. They have made things extremely difficult and impossible for U.S. sellers and many have left that platform. They are more favorable to foreign sellers listing the items on Amazon, which is slowly becoming TEMU 2.0.
ETSY on the other hand, in order to survive, have taken a page from Amazon and has been going that route too. There are still plenty of U.S. sellers on Etsy but but with considerable drop in sales as our current state of our economy is well, awful for small business owners.
Then there's ebay. Who is still chugging along and has also stayed afloat by adding more capabilities to their site that keeps them going.
So although we were band from ETSY, we still owed them a measly 40 cents all these yes. We never bothered to close our account officially since at first we thought THEY would be doing that since they banned us. The details on their band were quite silly and for some strange reason we were targeted. I will go into that another day for the sake of making our real point here. The thing is, it was really stupid and they could have kept us on but because they have stupid leadership, they paid the price since then when they probably kicked out alot of sellers back then too.
Now that ban seems to have miraculously been lifted!
I go in about every 2 years to see if my log in still works. It does...
And just to check, I noticed that I was still banned. I would get some pop-up notification that I am banned and that I had lost my appeal, etc.
I did try to close the account once. I believe I requested it and closed out the window about 2-3 years ago. Then, I recently logged in and it was still there! Apparently I owed 40 cents and I was not allowed to list anything new until I paid up. And there was no mention of the ban anymore! How strange is that!?
So as of now, I guess that I am in the clear again. Perhaps they need me back, lol.
I paid my 40 cents and updated some information on the account to make it current...and that banned pop notification never came up! The only thing left to do was to start making my first listing again....which I then stopped at so I can think about it.
Its been so long, to be honest, we have grown so much since then. These 3rd parties are not my thing anymore but we know that many people still love to use them despite that we have our own website. Prices on third party sites will not be higher than those businesses that have their own websites.
You see, these 3rd party sites need to charge for just about everything and anything you do with them. Its how they make their money. And not to mention, times are hard! Hell, its hard on us too but good ole' Xerxes does more than just jewelry. So we can cover that another day too.
I guess what I am pondering is, should we go at this again? We are still on ebay and Amazon and NOT ALL is listed on these 3rd party sites. We need to increase the prices just slightly on 3rd party sites to make up for the expense of just SELLING on 3rd party sites. The fees are non-existent on our site since we own that, however, we do not own Amazon, eBay, and ETSY so that where things are at.
The other thing I am thinking about, when it came to ETSY, there was alot of International buyers on ETSY. Perhaps the terms were more feasible. Maybe just easier to find items and we were indeed quite popular then. So its a thought.
What do you guys think of ETSY? Should we give it a shot?
We are thinking of just some items as we do with the others sites and just go from there. Hopefully we will not get band again. That homemade stuff doesn't go over well if you are trying to be a business, long term. Food for thought, to those who are thinking about starting a business. Anyway, just wanted to drop my story and ask what you guys think of this.
Xerxes
