Alchemy Down....Uniimi Up!

The answer, of course, is uniimi - yoU Name It, I Make It, a group of former Etsy shop owners who decided they've had enough and are creating a site that caters to the customer and the shop owner - rather than lining the pockets of webmasters who do little to nothing beyond setting up the initial site! Because of this Uniimi is free to join, free to setup a storefront, and you can choose to pay a flat monthly fee or a % per transaction fee! Best of all Uniimi is designed around custom requests with storefronts as a simple bonus - that's right, custom requests will NEVER go away! http://www.uniimi.com

Etsy was the pride and joy of the Internet for the handmade loving community. Setup much like eBay artisans could post their wares in individual shops and sell their items to the millions of handcrafting lovers of the world. The best feature of this site was a system called "Alchemy" where a buyer could request a custom made item and sellers can bid to make this custom piece. During the Christmas/Holiday seasons, especially, this feature was handy to request custom items from sellers whom the buyer was 100% sure would be active and responsive to a last-minute request! Sadly, Etsy has removed this alchemy feature. While some tired artisans have setup a thread to request custom items there really is no way to find a custom item unless you search through hundreds or thousands of shops to try to find someone not already bogged down to create your custom request!

I've had a storefront on Etsy since mid 2010 (http://www.jenbug122.etsy.com) and while I have enjoyed some of my time I must admit that many of the policies, practices and procedures of Etsy are quite aggravating. For starters the feedback is insane, people can leave positive or negative feedback for any reason and there is NO repercussions (at least on eBay you can leave a comment like: buyer wanted to return Halloween Costume after Halloween!) if this feedback is a lie or misrepresentation. Most sellers will simply start a new screen name when they receive this kind of feedback, others will reciprocate giving the seller negative feedback. Then both have to agree to change it before it will be changed - you can imagine how unlikely this is to happen! Next are the fees, 20-cents to list an item, and that is per item so if you have 20 buttons at 50-cents each 20 cents of that is just to put the listing up. Then you have to pay the paypal fee and the % per transaction fee...it adds up quick. For an example, $200 in sales will cost just about $50 in fees to Etsy alone. Finally Etsy is really bad about listening to their sellers. Unless you live in New York where Etsy HQ is located it is unlikely you will ever be considered for promotional materials, etc; and unless you are racking in thousands of dollars don't expect them to go out of their way to help you. Every time I have contacted support I get a link to an FAQ page (that usually has nothing to do with the problem) and told good luck.

So, being tired of Etsy- and Etsy getting rid of the Alchemy feature - I have moved on to other places. Granted none of them are as well known as Etsy, but that will (hopefully) soon change. Just like Amazon picked up on the eBay scares and problems hopefully sites like Artfire, Zibbet, and Uniimi will be able to ride the coattails of Etsy to the front of the pack and beyond!

Artfire.com is a little more difficult for sellers because they have a set flat-fee and pay-per-bid system. This especially gets frustrating when buyers are looking for something to purchase in the future and may or may not follow through - wasted bids.

Zibbet charges nothing to list (for basic membership, monthly or yearly fees for premium membership) AND it charges nothing when something is purchased. They specialize in handmade goods and the only fees that anyone has to pay is the seller's paypal account fees. This is great because sellers will generally lower their prices a bit knowing they don't have to pay a percentage fee. You can request custom items from a specific seller - come by and see what's going on: http://www.zibbet.com/jenbug122/

Finally the ground floor - for now! Uniimi was designed by a group of Etsy sellers who decided to band together and make it all happen. Concentrating first, and foremost, on custom listings and buyer requests the Uniimi site is quickly becoming a great competitor in the internet handmade marketplace. Buyers can view seller profiles, and view all activities on the site. In order to make a custom request or purchase a buyer must create a free account - this tells the seller where to send your products and gives an email address for further communication if necessary. Uniimi also contains a messaging system and built in blogspace! We hope to see you here really soon! http://www.uniimi.com/dragonstrove/