In 2023, we saw handmade sales take a bit of a nosedive, down by a hefty 40-50%.

Ouch!

But why did this happen?

In this blog post, I’m going to unpack five controversial opinions I’ve been thinking about how 2024 is going to affect the handmade industry.

I want to explain the reasons behind the market downfall and share with you what we need to do moving forward to keep our businesses afloat.

So, here are five harsh truths craft business owners need to hear.

No one cares about handmade

Let’s start with this: I believe no one cares about handmade anymore.

Here’s a little bit of storytime to prove a point.

For my handmade scented food jewelry business, Tiny Hands, I started working with an online retailer and they created an amazing video promoting my work.

It got over a million views on YouTube. That’s amazing, right?

It’s such a huge accomplishment to have the necklaces I made myself seen by a million people.

Of course, I felt so giddy. Who wouldn’t?

Then I had this urge to go check the comments.

And the excitement and the magic vanished just like that.

Too many people were complaining about the price!

I made this necklace with my bare hands.

It was stated that it’s handmade.

Even the video itself is trying to educate people on how it wouldn’t look as good if you tried to do it yourself at home.

Now, this isn’t the first time I’ve experienced this.

I actually started learning this the more I got into mass-market, commercial ways of selling my jewelry… namely, through selling wholesale to retailers.

Back in the day, I used to do so much more wholesale.

I did trade shows that cost thousands of dollars to do.

And I’d always end up feeling disheartened after hearing feedback from buyers, saying that many people still believe that handmade equals low quality and not worth a higher price.

I remember this one time when a buyer told me they didn’t believe that my products were handmade because the quality and presentation of everything I did looked too professional.

It just goes to show you what people expect handmade to look like.

But, this is also why, in my course A Sale A Day, I’m always harping on and on about how handmade is no longer a reason why someone buys from you.

People won’t buy your products just because they’re handmade.

They don’t care about that.

It’s just the cherry on top.

It makes them feel validated that they made the right choice in buying it.

But, first and foremost, your product has to be what the customer is looking for.

Nothing else matters until that condition is met.

The truth is – and I say this not to be mean or rude – strangers online don’t care that we’ve poured our hearts and souls into making our products.

Well, unless they’re our moms, right?

So if you’ve been primarily marketing your products as being handmade, you need to start thinking beyond that and talk in terms of what your customers really care about.

It takes research to figure that out for all of your unique, individual products.

For example, with Tiny Hands, people are searching for a unique and fresh gift idea, usually for little girls who like cute miniature things.

So, in my marketing, this is what I lead with.

Once I have someone’s attention, then I continue to educate them on the fact that my work is handmade, which helps them see why my prices are the way they are.

You’ll have to figure this out for your own products, because every business is different.

But, once you do, your products are going to sell so much better.

Handmade beats AI

The second controversial opinion I have is that AI is only adding more noise to the online space.

The problem we all currently have is that there is an impossible standard we need to meet.

The relentless demand to post frequently on Instagram, then get on Tiktok and make video content, then write blog posts every week, then send out weekly emails.

It’s a lot of content we’re expected to create in the name of getting our products seen by more people and, hopefully, making some sales from it.

It’s so much pressure.

Now, this isn’t about whether I’m for or against AI, but it’s just me observing that what AI does is to make it easier for people to create content.

Social media posts, product descriptions, blog posts – the likes.

Well, isn’t that a good thing? After all, more content means more visibility, right? 

However, it’s pretty hit-or-miss when it comes to the quality of the content generated by AI.

So what’s the new problem?

Quality control.

Now, we have waaay more content than we ever had before, and a lot of it isn’t any good because it is AI-generated.

If you thought the market was already saturated before, now it’s even more so because of AI.

But here’s where things get interesting.

I do believe that what this means in the coming years is that handmade will start to have more value to people.

It’s harder to make handmade products as compared to AI art or digital products or even print-on-demand stuff.

With AI, customers will be frustrated with all the same products they’re seeing over and over again.

The market will be so filled with sameness that the unique handmade items are what will stand out really well later on.

So there is going to be a growing appreciation for the authenticity and uniqueness of handmade products.

So if you make handmade products, keep sticking with it, okay? Don’t give up! 

Etsy is flooded, it’s hard to stay afloat

What even is handmade?

The bigger question is: what should be allowed to sell on Etsy?

Etsy used to be a platform meant for selling only handmade products.

Then they started allowing stores that sold products that weren’t manufactured in-house, like print-on-demand stores.

Then more and more digital products started flooding Etsy.

What began as a marketplace exclusively for artisans has evolved into an oversaturated marketplace that drowns out handmade products.

Well, the Cambridge Dictionary definition of “handmade” is “made by a person using just hands or tools, not by a machine”.

By that definition, AI art, digital products. and print-on-demand products should not be allowed to be sold on Etsy.

These products dilute the platform’s authenticity and undermine the efforts of crafters.

Frankly, if Etsy just got rid of all digital products alone, it would fix a lot of problems for us handmade business owners and balance out the Etsy economy.

Etsy’s customers are really struggling to find good products to buy right now, which I’m sure is a big motivation for Etsy’s new Gift Mode feature.

It goes without saying that they also need to get rid of dropshippers and mass-manufactured products, but it’s also a lot harder to make an effective algorithm to find shops to close down.

But there are too many shops there for them to do it manually.

So I think Etsy needs to make a call and make a bold move if they want to stay relevant.

There are a lot of copycats out there

Now, I think a lot of people are going to hate me for saying this…

But the very tools we love and use everyday is the exact reason we’re all in deep trouble.

I’m talking about Etsy tools like eRank and EverBee.

On one hand, they provide valuable insights into sales data, making it easy for anyone to find bestselling products.

But on the other, they’ve fostered a bad habit for people to simply copy what these bestselling products are.

There is such a huge toxic culture of IP theft and infringement right now because people are not being diligent about innovating on existing ideas.

Instead, they’re simply tracing line by line what is already working successfully for other sellers and calling it their own, rather than putting in the effort to innovate and create something different.

It’s terrible.

Let’s call it what it is: cheating. 

It’s a shortcut that undermines the creativity and originality that should be at the heart of the handmade industry.

It’s a blatant disregard for the principles of integrity and innovation.

Now, we love using tools like eRank and Everbee, so it wouldn’t be practical if we called for getting rid of them.

They have their merits and can be incredibly useful when used ethically. 

But this is a really good example of how we can’t have nice things because of the bad actors out there who use them for bad intentions.

People who just want to make a quick buck and who have no integrity at all of the creative process.

So if we make it a bit harder for people to find good products to sell, the competition will be less saturated.

That will fix a lot of the problems we have right now with the surge of competition in the last few months. 

You don’t need to do MORE

This one is going to actually make a lot of you feel the pressure taken off your shoulders.

But I believe a big part of how to keep our business afloat during tough times right now is not with doing more.

The knee-jerk reaction for many business owners is to double down on their efforts.

More marketing, more social media posts, more blog posts, more content.

More is not what we need right now.

As I mentioned above, there is way too much content out there already.

Instead, what we need to do is focus on how to do better at converting the attention we are already getting at a higher percentage.

It’s about optimizing your existing resources and maximizing your efficiency.

In other words, you should focus on improving your sales conversion rates.

When you work on this, you don’t have to worry day and night about trying to get as much traffic and views as possible, which is incredibly hard to do.

When you do this, you will be able to sell more without working more.

The beauty of this is not reinventing the wheel or scrapping your entire business model, but about identifying small, impactful changes that yield the best results for your business.

This is something I’ve been doing the last several years and really focusing on with my own businesses in the last few months.

And it has brought me some really incredible results.

Like how just by removing one thing from my cart page that took me three minutes to do, increased my sales by 3x.

And I didn’t have to do more marketing.

And the best part? 

There are so many other small tweaks like this that you can do in your business today that don’t take up hardly any time to do.

That’s what the Sell More, Work Less Challenge is all about.

Work smarter, not harder

I’m hosting the Sell More, Work Less Challenge, a FREE five-day event that’s starting soon.

We will talk about all sorts of these small tweaks that can make the biggest difference in your business.

I haven’t been this excited about something in a long time and this is going to be so much fun!

There are going to be a ton of opportunities to win prizes, there’s a free workbook, games and interactive daily live training and Q&A with me.

So if that sounds interesting or exciting for you, and if you think it’ll help you grow your sales and business this year, then come join us!

Sign up now through this link and secure your spot in the Sell More, Work Less Challenge before we close down after a couple of weeks. Trust me – you won’t want to miss it!