Back in the day (2009?) when I set up my Etsy store, there was a small processing fee for items sold and renewed. Fair enough. I just sold an item today and took a look at the fees… it was an eye-opener!
The cost of the item as displayed in the Etsy store was AU$17, made up of AU$14 for the item and AU$3 for postage within Australia. Along the way, I’d paid 20 cents US (29 cents in AUD) each time the item ‘expired’ (every 4 months), which is ~AU$1.20 per year. I made this item perhaps 10 or so years ago, so it’s likely I’ve paid well over US$10 in Etsy renewal fees for it (AU$14 or more).
When the item sold today, I checked the financial information and found that Etsy deducted 8 fees from the sale, totalling a further AU$4.80 (see screenshot), many of which I’ve never even heard of (e.g. what are offsite ads??). That means that whatever money I ‘made’ on the sale, has effectively been eaten up in fees—in fact the total cost over the item’s lifetime has exceeded the amount charged for it. Which means I’m giving my products away for nothing and am actually going backwards.
Added to that, I no longer sell to US purchasers because of the cost of dealing with the tariffs and the paperwork.
I think it’s time to close up shop.
Rhonda Bracey: At Random 