I’m Alive, I Swear, I Just Opened An Etsy Shop

I’ve been kind of MIA lately.  On Instagram…and Pinterest…and even on the blog.  The reason?  I’ve been up to my eyeballs in rustic, wooden iPad stands that we’ve been selling on our brand new Etsy shop, Roostic.  I couldn’t be more uber excited about the success we’ve already had with the Etsy shop, which we opened up last Friday and are already seeing results.  We’ll get to that in a minute.  First, let me tell you a little bit about our shop.  After SOOOOO many requests by you, dear blog readers to sell the iPad stands we threw together earlier this year, we decided to finally do it.  The shop currently has one product, the iPad stand, but we have plans to expand but stay within the rustic, wooden, home goods niche.  There isn’t as much competition in the wood, for-the-home product category on Etsy.  It’s a good fit for us and our skill set and we have intentions of carving out a little niche with our “rustic home goods with a modern twist”.  So we capitalized on the blog name and opened our Etsy shop, Roostic.

Recognize the logo?  It’s a spin off of the blog!

After just one week of sales, we were already selling strong with 22 sales, several of those sales for multiple items, and not a one to friends or family.  That’s just plain crazy!  Like Lindsay Lohan crazy!  Someone get me an ankle bracelet!  After reading so many articles about Etsy before opening the shop, we learned that it was common to go several weeks to months after opening a shop before you have your first sale.  Not us.  We buck normal at every chance we get.  I had an initial goal of selling four stands per month and growing it to four a week by mid summer.  Instead, I was selling up to 10 per day (I’ve been getting super friendly with our local USPS branch).  It helped that I launched just before mother’s day.

The craziest part of all of this, is that we only have one product…ONE!  And yet, we had ridiculous revenues with ONE product and in our FIRST week!  These iPad stands are selling like hot cakes and we can’t seem to keep them in stock.  Thankfully, today has been slow so I’ve been playing catch-up and stock piling inventory.

We made one little modification from our iPad stand tutorial.  Instead of using long screws that stick out the back of the wood flap, we found smaller screws and hardware.  Nothing puts a damper on a new business like a lawsuit after someone cut their hand on the sharp screws sticking out the back.  But we’re perfectly okay with the threat of damaging our own hands.  We live dangerously.

And instead of stapling the twine, we found tiny eye hooks that do the job just as well and look a little cuter.

And what makes my heart melt just as much, if not more, than all the sales is all the LOVE!  We’ve had 562 people check out our product, 107 have liked it, 3 have shared it on Facebook, 2 have added it to one of their treasury lists, and it’s ALL over Pinterest.  And I’ve even received a few lovely emails from some lovely shop owners gushing about the iPad stand.  This is why I love Etsy so much.  Like the blogging community, Etsy is friendly and supportive.

Going forward, I have grand intentions of sharing our Etsy adventure on the blog since it’s all integrated (our Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram feeds are linked to both the blog and the Etsy shop).  As we create new products and add them to the shop, we’ll be sure to announce them here first (designs are underway for a Kindle Fire stand and a cook book stand in a similar style to the iPad stand).  And I even want to put my MBA and my career as a marketing director to good use and do a few posts about operating an Etsy business (like how to position your product, market research, pricing strategies, SEO, and general marketing practices).

Pssst…I have to know, do you guys shop on Etsy?  Do you have any favorite shops?  My current Etsy obsession is all about Peg And Awl and Soap Revolt Naturals.