Can You Sell Items That Are Not Handmade on Etsy?

You must be very astonished when viewing "Can You Sell Items That Are Not Handmade on Etsy" for the first time, and even want to make a direct complaint against me. Please take it easy, believe me, and continue to read.

What Can Be Sold on Etsy? Is Selling on Etsy Worth It？

It is well known that Etsy specializes in original handmade items, including original designs or digital items, daily supplies with good design, decorative artworks, and vintage products, such as art wall, handmade quilts, or accessories.

On Etsy, artists will have an opportunity to bring their advantages into full play, share their original products with those sellers with common hobbies, and get financial rewards.

Whereas, on other large platforms such as Amazon and eBay, their items are easily copied by low-priced products of inferior quality; heavy competitive pressure and low price will contribute to a vicious cycle and shake the confidence of the artists.

💡Also Read on: Etsy vs Amazon, Etsy vs eBay, Shopify vs Etsy

Besides, Etsy’s simple operation procedures allow sellers to register an online shop and upload their items in several minutes, with relatively reasonable and transparent commission rates only required. All these demonstrate that Etsy is a distinctive shopping platform and a paradise dedicated to its sellers and buyers.

Therefore, if you’re an artisan of handmade artworks or a creative designer who is an expert in various digital products, welcome to Etsy, where you will meet like-minded people and buyers who have common interests in art and originality and are willing to pay for them. It is sincerely hoped that you will be aware of your sheerest initial intention for original designs.

Then, isn’t there any chance for sellers to sell non-handmade items on Etsy?

The answer is “No.”

How to Sell Non-Handmade Items On Etsy?

Legally Selling “not handmade” Items on Etsy

Specialists just need to do their job well. Some outstanding designers and artists may excel in creating artworks, but they are neither willing to enter into business operations nor able to transform their designs into goods on their own. People are not expecting some ingenious designs are produced in a common street house.

Consequently, you can work with such a designer friend to turn their inspiration into physical items through a qualified manufacturer. Next, you can upload the product information on Etsy and take charge of sales and post-sale services. In this way, you can promote the uniquely designed products to more customers and get paid on Etsy.

There is also an option tab “Production partners” on the platform. As long as you disclose the manufacturer information (its name, your relationship with the manufacturer, and some descriptions of your cooperation relationship) via the option, it is allowed by Etsy that the actual production is conducted by the manufacturer. The cooperation relationship is thus reached between you and some original design studios or the producers which can provide custom-made services based on design papers. Of course, effective communication should be made in advance among the three parties. You’re responsible for the shop operation to promote products and get paid, with the relationship details disclosed in the shop information.

Further, attention should be paid to the design originality and dedicated manufacturer, as well as prior confirmation of cooperation details to avoid unnecessary disputes.

Etsy Cracking Down on Fake Products

At this point, you must pose a question: Will Chinese and other buyers come flooding into Etsy and sell the homogeneous dropshipping products from the same factory, as Amazon?

Please rest assured that Etsy has completely rejected the entry of sellers with Chinese identity, with risk control and management strengthened. Strict requirements for new store applications are put in place. Once your products are detected as homogeneous with others, they will be compulsively withdrawn from sales, and even your account will be suspended. Meanwhile, you can directly complain to Etsy of plagiarism with evidences for your original items. Generally, Etsy would protect your legitimate rights and interests and stop the sales of fake products.

How to Stand Out from Other Etsy Sellers?

Nonetheless, people often come up with similar ideas sometimes. Would you like to know whether your designs will be recognized by the public?

You can search the sales of some same kinds of products on Etsy to have a rough understanding of the market competition.

Or, you may make use of some data analysis software to simply and directly learn detailed data of all categories of items on Etsy, and spare more time to create new products.

There are many types of such tools to analyze Etsy’s data. I won’t list them all, but just introduce EHunt, a kind of popular tool for Etsy sellers.

EHunt will present you with a comprehensive, intuitive overview of all product categories available on the market. The data captured from Etsy will be timely updated, along with an in-depth analysis of a specific store or product offered. It can provide your existing or new shop with sufficient data support and references for future sales prospects of your products.

On EHunt, you also can browse the recent search trend of Google keywords via the Keyword analysis. EHunt will capture the search volume of a product keyword across the mainstream search platforms of the whole network. You will have a clear understanding of the search popularity of main keywords under the category of your products over the same period of previous years.

Free screening of time zones or country/region functions is also available on EHunt. Intuitive curves and bar graphs will help acquaint you with the analysis data.

At the same time, EHunt will also offer you Similar Keywords and Hot Word Cloud according to the main keywords you search under the same category at the lower part of the webpage. The direct display of the most related keywords and hot word clouds gets your mind out of those scattered keywords, and likely inspires your next hot-sale product.

There are certainly analyses of similar shops on EHunt. A special section with multiple screening conditions (product category, country, time) is set on EHunt to present you with a multi-dimensional database for your understanding of top shops on Etsy. This is undoubtedly crucial for sellers.

Besides, many analysis functions, such as product database, list of best sellers, list of new launches, and product listings analysis, have all been launched and widely acclaimed. Please follow us for more information about Etsy. One Etsy-related post will be updated weekly for your convenient reference.

💡For further details follow our EHunt tutorial.

By the way, the EHunt extension is now available on your webpage, which will automatically show some data (like tags, favorites, and others) while you browse a product on Etsy. It will enable you to grasp a product’s key indicators in just a few seconds, greatly improving the working efficiency. Hurry up and install!