Unsurprisingly, the pandemic era gave a boom to the e-commerce industry, and many entrepreneurs found their way to a new world of customers and sellers. Crafty art-sellers have found their way out of misery with Etsy and other websites that permit arts and crafts creation and sales. A lot is resting on the Web to help you sell your antiques, books, electronics, and whatever can be sold. To aid you further, here are the best Etsy alternatives to make your selling experience worthwhile. Your choice will vary depending on your business size, budget, and other factors.
Disadvantages of using Etsy to sell your wares
- As Etsy became more popular, the platform also became saturated with similar sellers, thus increasing competition. Even a particular niche is no longer on the fringe, as you can simply find enough sellers selling the same thing.
- Etsy has also been accused of making arbitrary changes out of the blue, severely impacting the platform. Some of these changes are surely necessary, but often they demand sellers stay on top of the game.
- Despite what many people believe or promote, Etsy is not a get-rich-quick scheme, it takes a lot of effort, research, and hitting the mark over and over again.
- Sellers are also frustrated with the constant upscaling of commissions the platform charges them for each sale. Combined with other expenses such as the platform advertising their products, and payment processing, the profit margin is way narrower than one might think.
- Sellers are never in control, even of their own products, as they are only renting the space from Etsy and have no final say in how things play out.
- And finally, selling on Etsy ultimately harms your own brand, as the buyer will never associate the product with you but rather say that he got it from Etsy.
1. Big Cartel
Big Cartel is a platform for artists and designers to create and sell their work online. It’s simple to use and has features to help you promote your store. With this platform, you get a lot of freedom and can set up your shop to suit your needs.
Once you are ready to start selling, you can do so from within the dashboard. With your store is up and running, you can easily manage your business. Once you receive a regular income to fund your business, you can choose to be paid via check or PayPal. Checkout is quick and easy, and shipping can be done from within the dashboard.
2. Squarespace
Squarespace is a platform that enables users to create websites and blogs. This is a great way to build up a business or just give yourself the chance to expand your skills. You can build your business online and do it all from the comfort of your home.
You can make your own blogs and websites, and even sell e-books. Likewise, you can manage your social media, promote your business, and market products on your website. Squarespace is very easy to use and is completely customizable to how you want it to look. You can choose from a range of themes and even edit the colors if you want to make one yourself.
3. Wix
Creating your website from scratch? Here is the good news! You can start making websites and blogs using Wix. Wix has been around for a long time. It’s one of the best websites for creating a website, managing your social media accounts, and setting up your e-commerce pages.
Wix is completely free, and anyone can start their website anytime. Wix allows you to edit your site anytime from the comfort of your home. It’s easy to use and a great way to build your online presence.
Additionally, Wix allows you to expand your online business, allowing you to create your own website to showcase your products, services, and more. You can read our Wix review to learn more about this platform.
4. Weebly
Weebly is known for facilitating the creation of online portfolios and websites, regardless of whether they’re tied to arts and crafts. Whether you’re using Weebly for your business or as a personal page, you’ll find it’s very easy to use. It allows you to edit your site anytime and from any location. Besides a portfolio and website, you can start a blog.
You can also upload images and videos to make your site look professional. Moreover, you may pick among different templates and designs or create yours. There are many options to choose from when creating your site. The website-building tool makes it easy to add content, make changes, and adjust it to your liking. Weebly’s customization tools simplify tweaking your site as you see fit.
5. WooCommerce
WooCommerce is an open-source e-commerce platform that allows users to build their own websites and host them. Being a plugin for WordPress also helped since it is essentially free to use. Over the years, it has become a widely used e-commerce platform, thus making it a suitable alternative to Etsy.
Using WooCommerce is very easy and doesn’t require any specialized knowledge. You can simply follow the setup wizard and get your very own e-commerce portal. Since it is hosted on WordPress, post-launch tasks are also done quite well, as you can quite easily update your inventory, change or place ads, and manage orders.
6. Zibbet
Zibbet is a community for self-expression, individuality, and inspiration. You can make it anything you want when you decide to start a website at zibbet.com. Zibbet offers beautiful themes, customizable layouts, and many tools and features.
If you’re looking for a clean, easy-to-use online website-building tool that is fully customizable, Zibbet is an excellent choice. A majority of Zibbet’s users create their websites for personal use. But many business owners, arts and crafts included, use the self-hosted version of the product.
7. Bonanza
Bonanza Media is an e-commerce platform for anyone who wants to sell things online. The platform allows users to create their storefront, search and browse local items, check out from their desktop, or order from their mobile phone.
With Bonanza, you have full control over the look and feel of your online store, ranging from how items are organized to how they’re sold. Bonanza is a handy, easy-to-use platform that offers sellers complete management. It’s also a great way to promote your local business or city.
8. TinyMCE
Decided to try WordPress out? TinyMCE is an excellent and highly customizable WordPress editor with many options. One of the things that we love about TinyMCE is that it can be used on an unlimited number of pages, posts, and other sections within your website. This makes it one of the most versatile plugins on the repository.
Additionally, TinyMCE is an adaptable and functional editor that gives your readers the ability to do many things, making it a great tool for customizing content on your website. With TinyMCE, you have the freedom to create the layout of your website the way you want. You can also add customized button bars and menus, which allow you to add cool graphical features to your site.
9. Shopify
Shopify, the e-commerce platform, is a great solution for small businesses with websites and need to manage them from their mobile phones. Shopify’s app has been built with the needs of this generation in mind and supports both the iPhone and Android operating systems. Perhaps most importantly, it’s free.
This platform is a great way to create and manage an online store from the convenience of your smartphone. Shopify’s integration with the payment services PayPal, Stripe, and Braintree is a very important feature. You can easily use this online shopping platform by linking your credit card or bank account. This permits you to receive money whenever someone makes a purchase.
10. ArtFire
ArtFire works extremely well as an Etsy alternative. The platform allows users to host their online shops at $10 per month. However, this doesn’t include listing and transaction fees. Hence, users can create and host their shops online that can list and sell products. It has a rich and engaging community that connects and communicates with one other, often helping with sales.
Networking on ArtFire is one of its benefits. Also, the UI allows users to customize their shops without hindering the source code. ArtFire favors handmade and artisan products, but it doesn’t mean users can’t sell commercial goods. But users have to pay for a commercial modifier as charged by the platform.
11. Folksy
Folksy is an online marketplace where users can register to showcase handcrafted products for sale. It was launched in 2008 and, since then, has constantly gained users. Many users even revere the platform for its smooth handling of orders, and convenient shopping experience. Furthermore, the platform promises zero shipping charges, making it far better than Etsy, at least in the eyes of the buyers.
For sellers, the platform has been actively trying to attract more and more by introducing features like the Etsy import service, where users can import their entire inventory directly from Etsy to Folksy with a single click. The platform offers two plans: Basic and Plus. While the Basic plan is value for money if you only have a few listed items for sale, the Plus plan excels at high-volume transactions.
12. IndieMade
Indie Made is a simple and efficient solution for shop owners who want to manage their website and store without the need for costly and complicated dedicated tools. The website allows you to create and manage your online store in the blink of an eye, has a special design that adapts to any screen size, and is easy to use.
IndieMade is also integrated with a fully-customizable shopping cart and major payment gateways such as PayPal, Braintree, and Stripe. IndieMade pays your proceeds to your bank account monthly. It may not be the ideal option for large online shops, but it certainly is a great tool for entrepreneurs.
13. Volusion
Volusion is similar to WordPress in many ways. In fact, the company itself says, “Volusion has always had a presence in the WordPress community, but today we’re making it even easier for WordPress users to bring their business online.”
Like WordPress, it’s an e-commerce-oriented CMS (content management system) that’s easy to use and has hundreds of add-ons and plug-ins. It’s a perfect foundation for building an online store, regardless of whether you choose to use Volusion to run your website. To sum up, Volusion is a cloud-based integrated platform for selling products and services online.
14. Storenvy
Storenvy is a digital marketplace where social networking plays a huge role. It mostly supports indie brands where users can sell jewelry, housewares, and even handicraft items. The platform also holds a reputation for selling books, records, cosmetics, and tech-related items.
Unlike other Etsy alternatives, Storenvy offers a free-to-use online store hosting service that only charges for any transactions made on it. But unlike Etsy, Storenvy doesn’t enjoy a huge crowd. Although it is suitable for indie lovers, products are sold on commission. And without an audience, it can be hard to create huge market demand.