Photo: SOPA Images (Getty Images)
The makers of your favorite personalized pillowcases and DIY jewelry on Etsy are preparing for a digital strike to protest what they say are exorbitant seller fees.
Organizers say the strike will begin on April 11. For the duration of the protest, they plan to put their shops on Esty’s “vacation mode” in protest. They are also calling on buyers to boycott Etsy products from April 11-18.
At the time of writing Wednesday afternoon, nearly 5 p.m. people had signed an online petition in support of the strike, although it wasn’t immediately clear how many of the signers were Etsy sellers. Though commenters on the petition page cite a wide and varied array of disagreements with Etsy executives, the company’s recent decision to increase transaction fees for sellers by 30% seems like the straw that broke the camel’s back. This fee change, scheduled to take effect on April 11, would increase the seller fee from 5% to 6.5%. It also comes months after Etsy posted record earnings in the fourth quarter of 2021.
“Charging such high fees, making advertising fees mandatory, and making guilt-ridden sellers offer free shipping is eroding every penny I could make from sales,” wrote one petitioner. “That’s when customers can even find me among the dropshippers and copyright violators who have flooded the site.”
Sellers are asking Etsy to stop increasing transaction fees, create a new reseller protection plan, implement a faster complaints process, end its Star Seller program, and allow all sellers to opt out of offside ads and associated fees sign off with them.
According to the petitioners, when the price increase comes into effect it will be the second increase since 2018 and will result in a doubling of charges in less than four years. Offsite ads, which can be critical for sellers trying to expand their reach, are reportedly causing sellers to pay an additional 12-15% fee for each item sold.
The petitioners also object to Etsy’s increasing use of moderation bots, which they claim are shutting down sellers for unclear reasons. At the same time, sellers believe Etsy isn’t doing enough to prevent low-quality, mass-produced knockoffs from entering the platform.
“Instead of rewarding the sellers whose hard work has enabled Etsy to become one of the most profitable technology companies in the world, Etsy is slamming us, ignoring us, and patronizing us,” the organizers write.
Other commenters specifically called out CEO Josh Silverman, who, according to one petitioner, has instituted policies that prioritize the buyer and put the seller second. “He wants to make Etsy the next Amazon,” wrote this person. According to his LinkedIn page, Silverman became Etsy’s CEO in 2017.
Etsy CEO Josh Silverman Photo: Roy Rochlin (Getty Images)
In an email, an Etsy spokesperson told Gizmodo that the petition accounts for less than 0.03% of its total seller base and that the organizers’ perspectives do not align with the viewpoints of all sellers on the site.
“We are committed to supporting our community of 5.3 million sellers around the world by helping them grow their businesses,” said an Etsy spokesperson. “Sellers have repeatedly told us that they want us to expand our efforts on marketing, customer support, and removing listings that don’t follow our policies. Our revised fee structure will allow us to increase our investments in each of these key areas so we can better serve our community and make Etsy a popular, trusted, and thriving marketplace.”
Etsy workers are the latest example of a burgeoning tech labor movement
A record number of new unions were formed in the tech industry as a whole last year, according to data from Collective Action in Tech. A dozen new tech unions — including the Alphabet Workers Union, Code for America, and the New York Times tech workers — formed in 2021.
Although Etsy sellers are not unionized, they try to use the power of the internet and collective bargaining to their advantage. Recent polls suggest Etsy likely has a majority of Americans on its side: 77% of registered voters polled in a Politico/Morning Consult poll in February said they support workers’ right to collective bargaining .