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Etsy slashes almost a quarter of its staff

engadget.com

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Re: Etsy slashes almost a quarter of its staff

#41

Post by hinkley »

adventured wrote: post #6
madamelic wrote: post #3

This seems like the 'bubble' deflating. Not so much a bang , more of a fizzle as "the big kids" come in and cut deeply. That and investors keeping out of seed-stage funding because it has gotten so bloated by everyone wanting their own startup. I've seen Genius, Etsy, Uber... etc. It seems like a lot more startups are getting shook up and cut down.

Etsy looks to be just fine. Sales grew 33% for 2016 vs 2015. Their operating loss is down to a very small trickle at $2m for the latest quarter. To go with $275m in cash. They appear to have a very nice business that's trading for a reasonable four times sales and likely heading toward profitability. What's the problem? Cutting bloat is exactly what they should be doing, it'll drive them to profitability faster.

This smells like prep for a sale.

But I would warn them, based on prior experience, that having a pile of cash can turn you into a target for takeover from someone who wants your cash. Once the companies merge, all that cash becomes 'our' cash and they can use it to buy themselves a couple extra years of burn rate.

Re: Etsy slashes almost a quarter of its staff

#42

Post by erickhill »

20years wrote: post #26

I tried using Etsy only to have them close my shop due to my products "not being handcrafted" according to them. These were small things that I 3D printed and people were actually buying. They shut me down but allowed similar endless China produced products to stay. They were not too happy when I pointed out those China knockoffs. They also kept my money hostage from the sales I made. I will never again use or trust…

I buy 3d prints off shapeways.com. It's been a great experience.

Re: Etsy slashes almost a quarter of its staff

#43

Post by 20years »

erickhill wrote: post #42
20years wrote: post #26

I tried using Etsy only to have them close my shop due to my products "not being handcrafted" according to them. These were small things that I 3D printed and people were actually buying. They shut me down but allowed similar endless China produced products to stay. They were not too happy when I pointed out those China knockoffs. They also kept my money hostage from the sales I made. I will never again use or trust…

I buy 3d prints off shapeways.com. It's been a great experience.

Thanks! I will check them out.

Re: Etsy slashes almost a quarter of its staff

#47

Post by pc86 »

20years wrote: post #39
diffset wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also sell 3D printed items and they did the exact same thing to my account. I just emailed them and they had me send pictures of my workspace and process to prove my items are "handmade" and my account was restored within 48 hours.

I did email them but when I pointed out the Chinese knockoffs, that didn't go over too well. I guess I could have handled my response differently but come on! The fact that they closed my shop without pre-warning when I had sales along with pending orders really made me lose complete trust in them. Especially considering the endless Chinese products on there that are obviously not handmade. If they had contacted me i…

It sounds like you were rude to the support staff and that made them unwilling to investigate further. Something about honey and vinegar.

Re: Etsy slashes almost a quarter of its staff

#48

Post by Jonovono »

20years wrote: post #26

I tried using Etsy only to have them close my shop due to my products "not being handcrafted" according to them. These were small things that I 3D printed and people were actually buying. They shut me down but allowed similar endless China produced products to stay. They were not too happy when I pointed out those China knockoffs. They also kept my money hostage from the sales I made. I will never again use or trust…

hah similar thing happened to me. I provided them with my renderings that I made and everything showing they were home made. What I thought was crazy was quite a few months later I wanted to buy something on etsy. I couldn't log in so I emailed etsy staff. They told me my account was disabled. I asked them if that was only from selling things and they said that nope, I couldn't buy anything either.

""" Please do not open any new accounts on Etsy; they will be closed immediately and without notice. """

Re: Etsy slashes almost a quarter of its staff

#49

Post by stale2002 »

learc83 wrote: post #8

I remember hearing that Etsy had an unusually large number of women working on the development team. I wonder how this layoff is going to affect that? Will they keep up their diversity initiatives, or do they consider that more of a luxury? I also read that they were also hiring a lot of bootcamp grads. It would be interesting to see the percentage of layoffs coming from bootcamps.

From what I read, they aren't firing the engineering team. It is primary people in sales, marketing, and administration.

Re: Etsy slashes almost a quarter of its staff

#50

Post by stale2002 »

086421357909764 wrote: post #19
geofft wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. This is economically rational, as Alan Greenspan pointed out in 1983: > ... the senior staff, including Miss Eickhoff, Judith Mackey and Lucille Wu, is mostly female. Mr. Greenspan explains the gender bias with the free-market pragmatism that has become his hallmark: "I always valued men and women equally, and I found that because others did not, good women economists were cheaper than men. Hiring women does two…

By that statement though, you're implying that men and women aren't paid equally within Etsy. Which is against the whole of diversity and equal pay for equal work campaign isn't it?

They could be paid equally, but the women will be better engineers. Because a man of the same skill level will command a more senior job.
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