ETSY-Possible Platform for Indian musical instrument makers

[vasanthakokilam]

As many of your are probably aware that ETSY is an interesting e-commerce platform to hook up buyers and sellers of handmade and vintage items. ( http://www.etsy.com ) I have not participated there myself but I thought this is a good platform to introduce the numerous artisans of India and their hand made products to the global audience. ETSY has been around for 8 years and have self-selected buyers who like to buy non mass-produced items ( among the western audience this typically attracts the more liberal crowd, though not exclusive to them).

ETSY charges 20 cents to list an item for four months and if it sells they take 3.5% cut of the sale price.

Registering to sell is quite easy.
http://www.etsy.com/sell?ref=so_sell

Of particular interest to us in this forum is the marketing of hand made musical instruments to the world wide audience. Bamboo flute is the first thing that came to my mind since it is well known, there is potential for sales and it is relatively easy to ship worldwide. But it can be for the various other handmade musical instruments and accessories. It is not just for musicians, all sorts of people buy such stuff to keep it with them as valuable possessions or display them so they have stories to tell about it for generations.

It is not just for the Indian diaspora, the potential buyer community is quite huge. The ETSY community is around 30 million or so.

One obvious problem is that the artisans do not have the technical know how to open an account with ETSY, list it and go through the full sales process. I think that is a good business for some non-profit ( or even for profit ) organization to take up to help them market their stuff to this worldwide audience. It is better if it is as local as possible to the artisans.

Their way of doing business is quite the opposite of Amazon, for example. Amazon would like to sell you a product at the cheapest price and would even like deliver the item with a drone to your doorstep in 30 minutes. So, cheap and fast is their business model. ETSY buyers on the other hand swoon over a little hand written note from the seller. Cost is not the prime concern, it is all about quality and value they attach to hand made stuff. I think a lot of Indian craft-persons fit into that template very well.

I thought I will post it here so we can have a discussion on the viability of using ETSY for this and what we can do to help the crafts-persons in the musical field.

[cmlover]

When did we start permitting commercial propaganda
No doubt very useful with the CM (instruments) twist
Uday should take note!

[smala]

Just wondering how this topic was felt unsuitable for the Lounge.

[Rsachi]

Thanks VKLM!
Have forwarded to a friend who guides a flute maker in Kasaragod.

I am also big on e-marketing.

[vasanthakokilam]

CML, changed the title so you do not 'twist' my intentions. Ha..ha.. it is all about music related items and nothing else. Rest are just context.

Sachi, that is the type of initiative I am hoping for. Let us see if it works out.

Selling Music related art work is also a possibility worth exploring.

[uday_shankar]

Uday should take note!

Indeed. I have every intention of evolving the chitravenu into a specialty craft using all natural materials (with a little help from modern tools). But that's a way off ...

[cmlover]

VK
Who am I to stop you from helping the indigent CM tool-makers
( It is kosher as long as you don't get a 3.5% for the incentive from ETSY :d

[vasanthakokilam]

Of course. I have nothing to do with ETSY.