Thursday, January 18, 2007

Etsy in the Real World!



OK, for those of you who have never heard of Etsy, it is an amazing site that sells handmade goods. Crafters/designers/artists post their stuff, set their own prices, manager their own little "online store" and Etsy takes a small cut. It's a really great site, and a wonderful resource for us when we're finding cool stuff to bring to you guys here in Montreal. We thought our customers would be totally into this site and the designers we work with would be interested to hear about Etsys latest expansion project. Here's the info from their site:

"A couple of months ago, Etsy leased its first ever commercial space in Brooklyn, NY. Being the creative folks that we are, you know we would never be satisfied with some depressing, cubicle-strewn, scheisse box of an office in Midtown. Instead, we decided to find a space that will not only serve as Etsy HQ, but that will also be a communal creative space where we could offer resources, support, and classes to our users and the DIY community at large.

It will be home to parties, trunk shows, seminars, workshops, a lending library, and all other sorts of fantastic things. It will have a silkscreen press, a letterpress, film, music, and video production facilities, jewelry making stations, sewing machines, sergers, and so, so much more. We will call it the Etsy Labs, and beginning with a small opening party on February 1st, its doors will be open to you.

That said, organizing, equipping, managing, scheduling, and overseeing the day to day running of the space is a tremendous amount of work, and while we long ago gave up the idea of having a life outside of Etsy, we decided we needed some additional help. Seeing as Etsy is rife with talent, we plucked directly from its ranks and formally charged Anda Lewis, aka Stopsandstarts, with the many tasks connected with this new offline endeavor of ours. I truly hope you will work with her to make the Etsy Labs the best place they can be."


How great is this? Although HQ has no affiliation whatsoever with Etsy, we thought this sounded awesome, plus the fact that it's called "Etsy Labs" makes us think of mad scientist crafter/designer people, we though that was kinda neat-o too.

If you think this is a great idea and want to get involved some way, here'e the first step...

Donate!

Got extra fabric sitting around? Just upgraded your sewing machine? Have too many cans of paint cluttering up your workspace? Send them to Etsy, and let others put them to good use. Certainly this is better than having them end up in a landfill. Hello early spring cleaning!

You can send or drop off goods to:

Etsy
Attn. Anda Lewis
325 Gold Street, 6th Floor
Brooklyn, NY 11201

I really recommend taking time to explore this site!

www.etsy.com

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Me loves Etsy! That's were my online store is! :)

More Quebec & Montreal designers should go sell on there, we are a few handmade designers on the site, but not much! Come join us people! It's easy and very affordable for little ones like us! :)

(Keep in mind Etsy if for everything handmade! Search in the terms of use to know more about what can be sold or not!) :)