I tend to think of Etsy as being the place to go for cultural, rather than mass-produced consumerist, goods.

The problem is that most products only pretend not be mass-produced, when in reality, they are.

Perhaps the pretending is what people are paying/looking for. I certainly see a lot of that kind of thing when surveying supermarket shelves.

Do you really think so, that people don't want, say, a unique piece of jewellery but just to pretend - through what appears to be a fraud on behalf of the seller - that some over-priced mass-produced jewellery is unique.

I couldn't disagree more.

In part if I buy something on Etsy I'm considering that most of the money I spend will get re-spent in that person's local community. In part I'm trying to encourage them in their craftmanship/art.

    > Do you really think so, that people don't want, say,
    > a unique piece of jewellery but just to pretend -
    > through what appears to be a fraud on behalf of the
    > seller - that some over-priced mass-produced jewellery is unique.

I guess you haven't been to Pier One.

People do want an authentic, unique piece of jewelry. But they also want something affordable. Sometimes, buyers are a little willing to believe what they want to believe to accomplish both of those goals. And there is no shortage of sellers who will tell them what they want to hear (i.e. lie) to enable that.

For buyers who really do want something authentic, achieving that requires trust in the seller. That trust is something Etsy used to have in spades, and it's something that's been dwindling over time.

I mean, there has to be some level of overlooking the obvious going on. There's no way a person could sustain themselves on the prices that these items are going for, if they were actually hand-made.

I know someone who sews cute things; she'll post on Facebook about the progress, pictures of work-in-progress plushes, or purses, or coasters. She'll then go sell them on Etsy, and also post on FB for friends to buy. It's not a lifestyle business, but it's a way to recoup the cost of materials for doing something she enjoys doing. Often they're made from leftover fabric scraps from something she already made, so this is a way to recoup a little bit more from what she already sews.

It's really hard for small scale artisan workers to sell at a sustainable price _for a full-time occupation_.

Price are anchored lowered by comparison with mass-produced products and artisinal goods made in countries with lower cost of living.

I know people personally who sell on Etsy but only as a side-line. To me that's where Etsy and other craft marketplaces - Folksy, NOTHS - fit best.

Anthropologie makes a ton of cash from it.