Amazon takes on Etsy with its own handmade goods stores

As early as May, Amazon started handing out invitations to try Handmade, giving sellers an opportunity to reach Amazon’s 285 million shoppers.

“We have designed a custom shopping experience for customers looking for handmade items by bringing together numerous best artisans in the world, and they’re adding thousands of items daily”, Amazon marketplace vice president Peter Faricy said in a release. But they’re a bit different in size and scope.

Amazon is breaking into the handmade goods market with the launch of a new online store where artisans can sell their wares.

All of the products on the Handmade at Amazon site are factory-free and must be made by hand. There’s no listing fee or monthly fee to start. In what may be but is probably not an attempt to recoup a few goodwill, Handmade dictates that items sold there actually be handmade, a rule that Etsy itself eased up a year ago, allowing sellers to have the production of their goods outsourced as long as they were the originators of the idea.

And though Etsy’s sales remain strong, hitting $61.4 million in the most recent quarter, its mounting costs have given investors cause for concern. They just had to meet a certain criteria to be approved by the company.

The divide on manufacturing highlights the challenge that platforms for handmade craft sellers face: They want to preserve the personal nature of handmade goods but also help their sellers (and themselves) grow and make more money.

“It’s really about providing access to values-aligned producers, often in the sellers’ own community”, he said.

The new Amazon site debuted with an impressive catalog already. Before Amazon’s launch, Etsy staked the claim as the premier marketplace where artists could sell directly to consumers, but the Brooklyn-based company must now contend with Jeff Bezos’ massive business.