New to Etsy and terrified, but want to open a shop anyway.

[FranOnTheEdge]

Hi, I've been looking at Etsy for a while now, and I want to open a shop, but I don't want to get in trouble with taxes and VAT and... well anything else really.
I've looked at the tax question and there's no way I'll earn over £10,000 in this year, and ditto I won't earn over £81,000 and thus I'm not liable for VAT registration either...

Those were two of my bugbears, what else do I need to worry about?

What are the basic things I need to know about opening an Etsy shop? How much does it cost? What do I need to have prepared before I start? (apart from something to sell?)

What about SEO? Do I need to sort that out? where do I do it, how do I do it?

Fran
P.S. I'm in the UK, does that affect anything differently?

[Former_Member]

I don't know the laws in the uk but you can add tax to what you sell in your shop. You will be a business owner and when you go to file your taxes at that time, you save all reciepts, and you write it all off, trust me, your first year will be the one you make the less and you can put a percentage of your selks aside for tax time in case you sky rocketed and made tons of money and owe but from me to you, go for it, you will work all that out as you go. I opened my store not knowing anything about having a store on etsy and they helped me through it all. You just have to ask for help and there are some great store owners that really helped me on giving me advise and even a customer, cause I was kinda a mess and didnt plan it all out, I just said I'm going for it and im so glad I did, I Love etsy!!