ESS-157 ~ Etsy Craft Supply Sellers… Track Your Inventory & Shipping Processes Like a Pro

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As a seller of craft supplies myself, I know firsthand that having a good system of organization for both your inventory and shipping will help you have a quicker turnaround time and lower costs…

And that’s always a good thing for your customers.

Put Systems in Place to Keep Your Inventory Organized

First start by organizing things – both your inventory and shipping supplies – in a way that will make it easy for you to find them when you get an order.
- Etsy’s recommendation is that you use SKUs, which stands for Stock Keeping Units, to track your inventory
  - SKUs can be letters, numbers, or a combination of the two, and depending on how you use them, you should be able to immediately identify your products based on the assigned SKU
- The bottom line is that your SKU system should work for you… I’ll tell you what mine is and hopefully that will help you think about how you want to organize yours…
I sell a lot of crafting patterns…
- First I arrange them by craft, so sewing patterns are SP, quilting patterns QP, knitting patterns KP, etc.
- Next I arrange them in plastic bins by craft and number the bins so if I end up with 3 bins of sewing patterns, 4 of quilting patterns, and 2 of knitting patterns;
  - I’ll number the sewing pattern bins SP1, SP2, and SP3
  - The quilting pattern bins will be QP1, QP2, QP3, and QP4, and finally…
  - My knitting pattern bins will be KP1 and KP2
- Now within each bin, I will arrange my sewing pattern first in alphabetical order, so all the Advance patterns will be first and within the Advance patterns I will arrange them in numerical order since sewing patterns have number IDs
  - Next will be my Butterick patterns, then McCalls, Simplicity, Vogue, etc.
- I will arrange my other patterns similarly, if they have no numeric ordering then I will arrange them just alphabetically
- Now… When I create a listing I will grab a bin and work my way through it and in the body of the listing, at the end of my listing description, I will add the SKU for that item so that when it sells I immediately go to the listing description to figure out where I have that item stored.
Now apparently Etsy has incorporated a space for SKUs in the listings so you may not have to put them directly in the listing description
- But for me, this system works A-okay…

If & When Possible, Give Your Customers More Choices

So… Once you have your inventory organized, you can take advantage of Etsy’s variations options and offer your customers even more choices… “How?”, you ask…
- Well, once all your inventory is organized and you determine that you have variations of certain items then you can use this feature… I’ll use myself as an example…
  - If I have a particular sewing pattern for a dress, say Simplicity 2934, and it comes in sizes A, B, and C >> one each for small, medium, and large sizes…
  - I will arrange them the way I described to you earlier, but when I create a listing for this item, I will use the variations option to list each of these sizes separately, so that a buyer knows that it is not a one-size-fits-all pattern and they can choose to buy it to sew the dress in a particular size
  - If a buyer purchases the pattern in size B, the listing will remain and only offer options for sizes A and C when future shoppers come along
This is also a good opportunity to expand your product offerings… If you take a look at Etsy Studio you can see which Supply Categories are less crowded and you may choose to start filling those gaps
- At the time I am writing this, according to Etsy, the Paper and Writing Supplies categories have less inventory than some others and filling these could be a good opportunity for you to expand your business

Keep Your Packaging Uniform to Keep Your Shipping Prices in Check

Shoppers take the cost of shipping into account when making their buying decisions
- To ship smaller supply items, use small, light packaging
  - If you’re in the U.S. consider using USPS Priority Mail when possible because you will save on the cost of envelopes (the post office gives them to you for free)… and, then pricing will be consistent, especially if you use their flat rate option
- Buy your shipping and packaging supplies in bulk… I use Uline for all of mine
  - You get way better prices than if you buy them at retail from brick and mortar stores… Unless of course you catch a “going out of business” sale or something crazy like that 🙂
  - And they are more consistent than sourcing supplies on Craigslist or NextDoor… And believe me, I’ve done that, back in my more bootstrappy days… 🙂
  - If you want to get a bit fancier, and have it within your budget to do so, you can check out sites like BoxUp and Online Labels… These companies offer customized and branded packaging options
- If you’re in the U.S. or Canada, you’ll save even more money by using the Etsy Shipping Label option over regular retail postal rates

I’m not sure how they work it out, or what the incentive is to Etsy, but it is cheaper…

Now it’s time for you to take action:

If you like what you heard in this episode and think you could benefit from having this type of detailed educational tutorials about ways to make your Etsy selling experience better and more profitable, then please consider getting on the early notification list for (and subsequently subscribing to) “Etsy Success Strategies ~ The Audio Series” once it launches… Go to ConvoMe.com/ReadToMe to sign up
Now, please go and log in to your Etsy shop and do something constructive with what you’ve just learned.
Still have questions? Leave them in the comments section below this episode and I’ll do my best to answer them
Lastly, if you’ve found this helpful, could you please help me spread the word about this resource to other current or aspiring Etsy sellers?

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