Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Big opportunities await creative microbusinesses
BENTONVILLE — Tatum Whiting is supplementing her family’s income doing what she loves — creating art.
Whiting is the owner of the Speckled Art, which she runs out of her Bentonville apartment. Whiting said she moved to Northwest Arkansas with her husband, Mitch Whiting, about 20 months ago from Gilbert, Ariz.
The 22-year-old is one of 2 million people globally who sell goods through Etsy, an online marketplace for unique and creative wares, according to the 2019 Etsy Global Seller Census Report. Etsy was founded in 2005.
“Art has always been such a joy to me, so it really does bring a lot of goodness into my life,” Whiting said. “I’m also now a stay-at-home mom, so it gave me something to do that I loved.”
Online shops such as Etsy, ArtFire and Zibbet Marketplace are a few of the options for working artists to sell their wares online.
ArtFire touts itself as a marketplace attracting thousands of sellers from around
the globe monthly, and Zibbet Marketplace notes it supports more than 50,000 creative entrepreneurs from 130 countries.
Microbusinesses employ no more than 10 people, according to the Etsy report, and 80% of sellers run businesses of one. Whiting is the sole employee of Speckled Art, which she launched on Etsy about six months ago, she said. She said she finds operating a microbusiness through websites such as Etsy to be far less work than establishing the same services independently.
“It brings in traffic that I wouldn’t be able to get just on my own,” she said. “It’s not like my own, personal website, where everything is from my own promoting.”
Etsy contributed $5.37 billion in economic output to the national economy in 2018, according to the 2019 Etsy Global Seller Census Report. The online marketplace created 1.52 million jobs and generated more than $1.7 billion in income that same year, according to the report.
“Sellers impact the economy directly through their sales and their work, but also generate economic activity in other businesses by supporting their suppliers and by spending their incomes,” according to the Economic Impact of U.S. Etsy Sellers report by Mysidewalk. Mysidewalk helps local organizations gain an understanding of complex data that’s collected and shared online to help shape decision making.
PANDEMIC REALITIES
David Johnson, 67, of Pineville, Mo., has been making handmade pottery since 1976 for his business, Bear Hollow Pottery, out of his home and studio just off U.S. 71 on the Arkansas-Missouri line.
The artist creates dinnerware, decorative household items and bird feeders for Bear Hollow Pottery and said he began incorporating Etsy into his business about 12 years ago.
Johnson’s wheel-thrown pieces feature earthy designs and rich colors and incorporate stoneware and porcelain into the clay mixture before being glazed and fired in a kiln.
Bear Hollow Pottery features about 30 pieces in its Etsy store, which range from about $20 for a sponge holder to $103 for a set of stacking mixing bowls, according to the business’ Etsy page.
“Etsy for me in its best year might pay the electric. This is not Etsy’s best year for me,” Johnson said, noting sales for his Etsy store have slowed during the pandemic. “Working artists are taking a big hit.”
Whiting said she’s been working throughout the pandemic, although business has slowed for her Etsy store as well. She attributes a decrease in sales to buyers prioritizing essential needs over art.
“I have really started to focus more on the social media content I am posting, because I know that directly corresponds to my Etsy sales.”
The artist creates colorful digital illustrations using an Apple iPad, an Apple Pencil and a $9.99 application called Procreate, she said. Her studio is the couch in the living room of her 850-square-foot apartment.
Her pieces range in size from 8 inches by 10 inches to 11 inches by 17 inches and include original works and commissioned portraits, she said. The artist sells as many as 20 pieces a month through Etsy for $12 to $85 each, she said.
“People will send me a family photo, and then I create a portrait based off of that photo,” Whiting said. “Sometimes, people will give me several photos, and I get to piece those together for a family that doesn’t have a family photo. That’s been really cool, because sometimes people get this portrait that they couldn’t have otherwise.”
BUSINESS BASICS
Operating a creative microbusiness isn’t a first for Whiting, who said she began making and selling art for her friends when she was 15.
“I started making art for my room, and my mom encouraged me to post it online,” Whiting said.
That initial enterprise grew into opportunities to sell her work through social media, craft fairs and holiday boutiques, she said.
Her previous experience as a customer on Etsy made the online marketplace a natural choice as a sales platform when she began Speckled Art, she said.
Etsy, ArtFire and Zibbet Marketplace all direct online buyers to sellers’ microbusiness pages based on what people search for through the online marketplaces, according to their websites.
Whiting said she finds the cost to list the works for Speckled Art to be nominal as well.
It costs 20 cents to list a work for sale through Etsy, according to Etsy.com. There’s a 5% transaction fee on the sales price for sold items, and sellers who accept payments through Etsy are charged a 3% plus 25-cent payment processing fee for sold items.
ArtFire offers monthly plans for sellers ranging from $4.95 per month with a 23-cent listing fee per item to $40 per month with a 4.5% final valuation fee on sales, according to ArtFire.com.
Zibbet Marketplace charges sellers a $5 flat rate per storefront per month with no listing fees, according to zibbet.com. Sellers keep 100% of the profit made through the marketplace.
Whiting said she has an average of 15 items listed at any given time on Etsy, equating to about $3 in total fees to list her works for sale every four months, she said.
Johnson agreed it isn’t expensive to operate an online microbusiness but finds doing so to be labor-intensive.
“There is photographing of each item, posting them online, answering inquiries and, of course, boxing and shipping,” he said.
Sellers must do some planning by creating product photos, a business profile and shipping and return policies, she said. The online marketplaces take much of the work out of the process by compiling such information to help sellers establish a functioning online microbusiness, she said.
“All of that takes a little bit of time to get situated, but I still think it would probably be way less time than creating your own personal website, where you have to do that stuff anyway,” Whiting said.
MICROBUSINESS ECONOMICS
Microbusinesses represent 92% of the nation’s businesses, according to Bigger than you Think: The Economic
Impact of Microbusinesses in the United States by the Association for Enterprise Opportunity.
The association says it is a national voice for microbusiness and microfinance seeking to create economic opportunity for underserved entrepreneurs.
The majority of sellers spend about 20 hours or less working on their creative businesses weekly, according to the Etsy Global Seller Census Report.
Being the lone employee of a business using digital tools and relying upon local businesses for printing and shipping means Whiting has minimal overhead to run her business, she said.
“There’s not really a lot of risk,” she said.
Whiting said she’s spending about 15 hours a week on her business but anticipates working more as her young son becomes more independent.
Some 82% of microbusiness owners would like to grow their business, but more than three out of five wouldn’t want to grow so big they would have to hire more help, according to the Etsy report. Sellers rank launching a product line or brand and purchasing new equipment as among their top overall goals.
Whiting encourages other artists to explore using an online marketplace to sell their work.
“Someone that is just wanting to try it, they can put their stuff out there,” she said. “If people bite, they do. And if they don’t, they don’t.”
“Etsy for me in its best year might pay the electric. This is not Etsy’s best year for me.” — David Johnson, potter