I love Etsy. That’s why I’m in a session now with founder Robert Kalin, talking about ‘the future of commerce’.
“Etsy is a marketplace for individuals, but really also a soapbox for people to show off their products.”
Etsy has sold around 1.4 million items. Kalin sees this as a small start for a much bigger future.
“The job of the design is to get the hell out of the way and let the pictures talk”
Core to success is the human to human element of the site, things that have meaning, and not some huge corporate beast.
Shop by colour as innovative experience – used by first timers much more than regular users.
Social shopping: a platform for anything not mass-produced.
Commerce is often below the radar as far as web2 is concerned.