TallTayl

I do plan to try them both. Leather alone does not sell, but as a component to a special blend for my faire it is a best seller. Have been looking for a whiskey flavor, but the scent may work well into another blend! Looking for a good rum flavor and scent. Not Bay Rum, i have that, but a straight rum.

Puma, i have tonic (the original from TSW) out being duped now. It's been a few months since i sent it in, so I expect it back any day

JAJC, your journey has been inspiring. I remember reading your early posts as you were working toward your first vendor fair at your work place. Oh, how far you've come! Looking forward to the next chapter.

I master batch oil dispersible TiO2 with FCO in a bullet bottle. Stick a couple stainless steel nail polish mixing beads and it is super smooth, ready to use at a moment's notice. No specs any more unless i am impatient and use a fresh mix without waiting long enough to wet the particles. No glycerin rivers.

The source of the traffic DEFINITELY supports your own site. If you can manage the site, and the monthly/annual costs of the site are less than the Etsy commissions, then it's an easy decision for sure. Regional Rate boxes are the greatest thing in shiping since sliced bread and ECOpeanuts =) " I work wax part-time in addition to a demanding corporate career so I have as much business as I can manage. " time to taise prices a smidge to lower the work load and keep the income similar

That is some crazy high shipping. I bet you freaked a little looking at the total before the actual lines of the statement. I sure would have, lol. but super cheap fees based on the top line sales for the month. Kudos. You have arrived! Well done. Were you calculating shipping well so that the net was zero on the shipping labels number? IMO/IME etsy is a nice pool of buyers that i ordinarily would not have access to. I send " my" hard earned, in-person customers to my own site. I have already "paid" to gain the customer, so no sense adding a commission to etsy for a sale that i would have made on my own site anyway.

Did a little more digging. They make it really hard to understand there are TWO chip readers available: One is the Apple version, the $49 / "free" if you use it enough to get the fee rebates for the limited time. Available some time around October if you reserve now. The other is the non-apple one for a flat $29. That one is available now. The $29 is the same price PayPal is offering for their chip reader. Can't find my confirmation for the Apple one, but was told i can cancel it and just buy the $29 one.

They have been unresponsive for years to many of us who offered to buy her codes... Many of us on another forum have had our own dupes made of the "must haves". A couple are available retail (blue sugar from aromahaven and blood orange patch at Daystar come to mind). Such a huge, sad loss, but life goes on. Hoping you have more luck

Sometimes a device is not yet supported, but still works fine.

The latest class session is about to come to a close. I have hardly anything hitting the big kiln this time. Since this original post i did get a wheel for home (two actually, one for me and one for my daughter), but darnit all we have so little time right now to use them this time of year. My goal this session was to learn to throw taller forms. Most of them get sacrificed - being cut in half so i can examine the structure. Makes for a great learning experience, but leaves nothing to "show" for my time

I don't know what the magic number is any more either. All those golden rules changed a couple years ago. But... a few stellar listings that engage the customer are better than scores of ho-hum listings, if that makes sense. Edited to add: more listings increases the law of averages, meaning the more items you have, chances are tags from a few listings will appear in many different customer searches. They only need one of your listings to click into your shop. The key to etsy success is figuring out who your customer is, then creating a shop experience that draws them in like a tractor beam. When people love you and your shop they are loyal to a fault. Etsy offers shop critiques in at least one of their forums and teams. As you begin your journey, i would take advantage of the collective knowledge in those teams! You may not hear what you want to hear, but it is all meant to help your shop succeed

Maybe the fees will be more understandable with a real-life example: Example etsy bill from a month. Bill for month X $324.58 Summary of This Month's Activity Listing fees: $7.00 (35 new listings) Transaction fees: + $38.60 (3.5% of the month's sales) Private listing fees: + $0.00 Edit fees: + $0.00 Renew fees: + $0.20 (manually renewed one deactivated item) Renew Expired fees: + $1.60 (manually renewed 8 expired listings) Renew Sold fees: + $27.40 (137 sales for which i set multi-quantities of items to be automatically relisted after the sale) Search Ads fees: + $0.00 Promoted Listings fees: + $0.00 Shipping labels: + $249.78 (all paid by the customers with the order. I received the money into my paypal or direct payment escrow. This line is just to pay back etsy for basically loaning me the money) Other: + $-0.00 Fees = $324.58 So, all the 131 sales cost me in etsy special fees was $27.40+ $38.60. $66 is pretty darned cheap for the top line revenues that month.

This is really an irrelevant question. Not to be a jerk, but the fees include many things that make it seem more expensive than it really is. I'm not sure people actually read the statements before they throw up their hands saying etsy is too expensive.https://www.etsy.com/help/article/136 Monthly Fee statements include: Listing fee of $.20 per item 3.5% selling price commission Shipping (which the customer has already paid if you have done things right) So, when i tell you that my monthly statement of fees averages $300+ you may immediately think, whoa etsy is expensive. But... All of the accumulated shipping charges the customers have paid to get packages around the world is included in that aggregate number. The only "extra" fees on etsy versus your own web site are the $.20 per listing and 3.5% commission. To me, 3.5% of a sale is super cheap. It is a lot cheaper than marketing to customers myself. It's far cheaper than a craft show booth fee when a show is rained out. All the other fees we pay every single online transaction. A big mistake is underpricing listings. You have to be able to cover expenses and actually turn a profit. No profit=no business. It can calculate automatically based on how you set it up. You could also set your own shipping costs per item based on your own estimations. I used to do the manual version. Some i would lose a buck or three shipping, others i would overestimate. Recently I took the time to convert every single item to autocalculate based on weight and dimensions. It's not perfect, but pretty close. Rarely do i "lose" money on shipping since investing the time to figure it out.Hope this helps.

Yes.What the change comes down to is this: card services is trying to cut their fraud losses. By shifting the accountability and financial burden for fraudulent charges to us, the merchant, they are more profitable. If a card has the chip, and a merchant chooses to run the mag strip instead, the merchant assumes all financial responsibility if the charge is fraudulent.

Will reply when I get home, but loads of answers for you...

Another great place to see what the competition looks like is craftcount.com You can query by top overall sellers or by your category. Look at what the top 25 in your category are doing, does it fit with your strategy? I was kinda jazzed when i saw my main shop in the top 200!

Look at their main site: http://www.outlawtradingco.com Not sure if they ever had an etsy site, was must pointing out some pretty strong branding. The owner, Danielle, worked for a few multinational companies. Her blog shares some of her life lessons with her brand, something i find very interesting as i continually adapt with my own.

The algorythm to keep you on the first couple pages changes. Used to be 'fresh' listings. Now the etsy development team claims 'relevance'. In my case, I looked up the words used most often to search out my top products (shampoo and deodorant). What words to people use to look up 'my' type of product? Deodorant. DeodErant, Natural Deodorant, Deodorant stick, etc. Shampoo bars, solid shampoo, syndet shampoo, etc.Google has lists of relevant words I check out from time to time too, but ust typing words into the search bar right in Etsy tells you exactly what people use when looking for my products. Then I use all 13 tags and the most popular search words and terms in the listing titles without looking like I am trying to tag stuff. Then... post some good photos all arranged similarly so that when a pic shows up in a search people automatically know it is mine. I use the same label styles, background, perspectives, etc. Check out places like Outlaw Soap company. THey use the same skull and 6-shooter in each photo so you automatically recognize the brand. Finally, related to the above, chose packaging and labeling that is consistent through the whole brand. Having too many styles, labels, designs on labels, etc dilutes the identiy and makes it confusing. Having a consistent soap shape, for example, makes it super easy to know which in that huge list are mine. Cutting things that are not 'on brand' was hard, but so worthwhile. I list a LOT of stuff. Having 10 or so listings does not generate enough clicks, so 100 is what I aim for. Once you get your loyal customer base they do a lot of the work to keep you up front by clinking, buying, favoriting, etc. My shop is on vacation as the summer event winds toward an end. Once I get it back up I'll list fresh new scents and blends, then make sure I keep showing up on pages 1, 2, and 3 by notifying my customers that I have new things. Generating excitement about what is coming keeps them clicking the "notify me when the shop reopens' button. As soon as the shop re-opens the orders come in. Hope this helps =)

The marketing piece is missing from most plans I know of so many people who have an excellent idea and product, but miss the mark on who would buy their stuff. Then they ponder how small business is expected to fail and chalk it up to bad economy, etsy, ebay or whatever. Then you see people with what we consider marginal stuff who sell and sell and sell at premium prices! The key is: figure out who is your ideal customer then show up in front of them. Stay in front of them. If your ideal customer shops at fancy department stores, then you will not likely get in front of them at a local craft show or flea market. Get your stuff into the stores where they shop. Tweak up your story, branding and packaging to grab their attention. Rinse, repeat. Facebook can be ok, but i figured out early on the biggest audience on FB was competition . So i started hitting my customer list and in-person customers and driving them to my pages. Blogging helps too. Share interesting stories about what inspired a scent or color, etc. when people connect with you they will be excited to buy anything and everything you come up with. Check out who you consider your competition. Study what they do. Don't copy their exact concept, but take parts that really stand out and apply them to your shops. Look at their tags and keywords and use them.

I have both, etsy and my own online stores. It really isn't a magic choice of one versus the other since both take a lot of work to generate traffic and sales. With Etsy, you are automatically in front of tens of thousands of buyers looking to buy great handmade products that make them feel special. Getting that much potential traffic to your own site takes a lot of marketing skill and money. Having your own site can be great, especially if you're good at maintaining a catalog, updates, tagging and getting found on search engines. In both places you need to learn to create an excellent story and a brand that resonates with your kind of customer. In both places you need to drive people to your shop. tag your listings using words that your customers use to be found. It takes a lot of trial and error and PATIENCE. One mistake people leaving etsy make is thinking their hard-earned customer base will follow them to your own private site. Etsy is a powerful culture, where customers want to shop only within etsy. Isn't it kind of funny thinking etsy is crowded with sellers in our niche when the great big internet has tens of thousands more? What does your brand offer that others cannot? Why is your brand special? Capitalize on that, choose your ideal customer and work to attract them

All good info. Am on my phone but wanted to share another melt pool problem I had. when the mp gets too deep it can sometimes melt the wax coating on a wick making the Wick no longer rigid. Then the wick sags, sometimes drowning, sometimes lying on the glass wall. I came across a picture of an old failed candle that reminded me of this

As for the deep melt pool, manufacturers recommend no deeper than 1/2" at any point in the burn. Somewhere along the line it became a goal to achieve a deep wide MP as quickly as possible. After you've burned a few truly excellent candles you'll see why some little changes can have huge improvements to your candles. Candle science has a video about choosing the right wick. WickIt, i believe has a document explaining the goals of wicking candles. I'll need to look for it. They also have a service to perform lab tests of customer candles. Found it: http://www.wickit.net/selecting_wick.html ASTM has a powerpoint presentation showing how candles, in that department's opinion, should perform to be considered safe. There's a link to it somewhere on this forum. I'll need to do a search to find it. The battery of tests they perform was enlightening to me when I read it. Found it: http://www.eca-candles.com/pdf/WorldCandleCongress/ASTM%20Standards%20and%20the%20Candle%20Industry%20-%20Becker%20Moss.pdf THe biggest lesson I learned the hard was is that heat generated toward the last third of the candle can be tremendous. Candle glass is subjected to many heat/cold shifts and over time weakens. Anyne familiar with food canning knows that even those jars crack and shatter easily spilling that precious goodness all over the counter. Having glass shatter across the room where moments before my daughter had been standing, leaving a burning puddle on my table almost made me give up chandling for good. It was not even my candle. Edited to add ASTM presentation.

Soot can be from a number of causes, like too much fragrance, too much dye, incomplete combustion of the wax or combo of all ingredients. I get soot when a candle burns too hot. You can see black puffs as the convection within the jar changes. One of the worst sooting 'soy' candles was from a local retailer. Within the first 2-3 inches of burn the glass was solid black. It burned with a super deep melt pool making the wick struggle to keep up causing the incomplete combustion. Sadly did not throw any better than any other candle :-/ The fast burning makes sense. With three wicks, you're in essence burning three candles at the same time in less than three candles worth of wax.. If you have not already, I'd try a different wick series in your wax/candle. ECO burn hotter than the CD series IME for instance. HTP, Premier and LX series wicks also get rave reviews by many different chandlers. a simple wick change and may be the ticket to a great throw without the super deep MP and related sooting issues.

http://www.ifraorg.org International FRagrance Association. IFA must have been taken

River Birch Paper Birch Birch Grove Birch Afire Spicy Birch Birch Basket I have a hard time with this one myself, largely because I have several stands of birch trees and Cracklin' Birch smells nothing like them even if I imagine really hard . It's a spicy sweet more than woody scent.