Does anyone else miss when Etsy was mostly small businesses and actual artists?
This is probably old news to most people that Etsy has changed so much, but I’ve been chronically ill for years and am only now slowly making my way back into the living world again. Recently, I decided to browse Etsy for ceramics and handmade wood furniture, and honestly… it just feels like Amazon now.
You have to do so much research just to figure out whether you’re actually buying from an artist or getting a mass-produced, drop-shipped item. I know there are still real artists on there—I’ve found a few—but the platform feels flooded with junk now.
Does anyone else find this frustrating and disheartening? It feels like yet another space that used to support individual creators got overtaken by mass production.
If Etsy is going to allow those kinds of products, I at least wish they’d verify handmade claims better and offer a filter so people can specifically shop from actual individual creators instead of mass-produced sellers.