To be honest i am okay with this. Before they bring this back, first they need to fix how they classify items. My handmade items are classified as designed by. While mass produced items are classified as Made By. If they bring this back i will completely filtered out their searches.
Why would Etsy think that anything personalized must be "Designed by"? Many sellers with personalized items create, sew, paint, etc. their items. The "Designed by" lumps handmade sellers in with the multitude of POD items. Sad.
@TBQSC Unfortunately that's not what happened with my ring boxes. They're all personalized and they all have the same info checked off for how I make them. The single boxes say designed by but the double sets say made by. Makes no sense at all.
If your handmade items are made by yourself, then they should be labelled as made by your shop name. Designed by means they've bought the product in and get away with making out they've got a "production partner" but it's mostly just mass produced rubbish that's flooded Etsy in the last few years. Sad really considering what Etsy once was.
To add to my comment and also address other comments. I think if all you are doing is buying in mass produced items from china etc and adding personalisation, then yes that shouldn't be classed as "made by" as you didn't make it.
This is my fear as well. I have to use the personalization box as a third variation since we're limited to two. Any of my handmade items that use that dang box say Designed by instead of Made by. I reached out to Support ten days ago via email and keep getting the same useless, canned response back. I keep replying that I still need help, but honestly I don't think anyone at Etsy cares and have no faith they will fix it.
The next advertisement tag line will be "Keeping it AI All the time", with TV ad showing a robot maker, wheel throwing ceramic clay mugs w/their humanoid counterpoint role swapping in self-destruct mode as the ending scene...Whoosh...SPLAT!?!!
On the Plus Side: In the meantime, Vintage is getting a well deserved, yet most likely short-lived visibility lift. Whooo hoooo Vintage! Make hay while the sun shines!
I have been out of the Etsy loop for a little while to deal with personal issues, but did I miss an announcement on the filters? When I search for things, I filter to search for Handmade. That option has been removed, and I can only select Vintage. What happened? Is this another test? If so, it sucks!
I noticed it missing when they introduced the new listing form. Since Etsy is either handmade, vintage or supplies, those three filters should be plainly visible.
Etsy's management seems to have a distaste for the word handmade. In their defense they aren't necessarily wrong that people search in different terms. And as they've shared shoppers seem to prioritize unique over handmade. But this does not mean that shoppers don't prioritize handmade items because some targeted audiences do! And people often use alternative search terms which means the same thing. It will be interesting to see how the next few years go with this demographic. There are some newer upcoming sites with stronger backing which may eventually do better in this market.
