I was browsing my favorite wedding blogs yesterday when I came across a super wedding planning tip over on Wedding Planning in Exile. Bride in Exile wanted to mix and match letterpress printing and flat printing on her wedding invitations and RSVP cards but found that most wedding invitation printers aren’t keen on doing up matching designs in different printing styles. Not one to be deterred, Bride in Exile outlined her wants (and her budget) on Etsy’s Alchemy advertising board where buyers can post requests for custom handmade items and sellers can bid on the opportunity to make the goods. Needless to say, she got what she wanted at a price that worked for her.
Of course, the Alchemy board isn’t just for wedding stationery! You can post requests for anything under the sun, from wedding favors to custom wine glasses for your wedding reception to your wedding gown. It seems like requests get a lot of attention from Etsy sellers, making this one of those resources I wish I had known about (wish it had existed?) when planning my own wedding.
Hey, cool! Thanks for the shout-out, NtB 🙂 Etsy has been one of the most delightful wedding planning finds for me, and it’s definitely not just for stationery.
You’re more than welcome, Melissa B.! When I read about your experience, my first thought was “Why is everyone not doing this???”
Etsy’s Alchemy is great. My husband just gave me a pendant he had custom made for me using Alchemy. It was a birthday present but it’s really in honor of the birth of our daughter Aurora–it has a stylized sunrise and her name engraved on it, with her birthstone (opal), and garnets and citrines on the sun’s rays. It’s just gorgeous, and he would have had a hard time getting such a thing made without Etsy. As we don’t know any custom jewelry designers! So I heartily recommend using Alchemy. So many people on Etsy are trying to support themselves or are supporting themselves using their talents, so it’s great to give them business. Especially these days.
What a beautiful name, Pencils! I agree about spreading the business around — I’d much rather support an independent craftsperson and get exactly what I want (when it comes to jewelry) than go down to Zales or something where a salesperson is going to give me the upsell. The fact that one can get stationery and just about everything else on Alchemy is a serious bonus.
Thanks, NtB! We love the name too, and we’ve gotten so many compliments on it. And we didn’t even remember the Disney connection until months after we had chosen it. Anyway, I love Etsy. I’ve had custom stationery made by an Etsy artist, I get all my greeting cards from Etsy these days, and I had a quilt made for Aurora by an Etsy artist. It makes me feel good that I’m supporting artists. I’m planning on buying a mobile for Aurora from Julie Frith via Etsy. She makes amazing Calder-esque mobiles, and her Etsy site says: I really love making mobiles, please help support artists like myself. This is all I (and my husband) do, nothing else but make mobiles everyday to support my family. Over 10 years of happy mobile customers. I’m happy to help support her!
Having finished my Etsy Alchemy experience, I wanted to come back to this post and pass along some advice for future buyers. I still really recommend Etsy and most of its sellers, but my Alchemy invitations project ended up being pretty stressful — once the seller had my money she turned into a noncommunicative, deadline-missing nightmare (she has since closed down her Etsy shop due to multiple unfilled orders). We did finally get our invitations, and I love them, but I wanted to pass along a couple of tips for anyone else who goes the Alchemy route.
1. Do not pay for a project in full up front (yes, I know, “duh!”). Specify in your Alchemy request that you will put half down and then pay the other half when your order is ready to ship (or 25% down, 75% when it’s ready to ship, whatever you’re happy with). Even if the seller seems really nice and has 100% positive feedback (like mine did), it’s much better to split the payment.
2. Establish a clear timeline. Even if you’re ordering months in advance, like I did, give the seller a deadline. You may think “oh, I have plenty of time, I’m not worried about a deadline!” You won’t be thinking that when you want to send the invitations out in 10 days, you still don’t have them in hand, and the seller won’t answer your e-mails.
3. Be aware that PayPal has a 45-day deadline for disputing any charges. If this deadline passes, PayPal can’t do much for you. Etsy Support may be able to help motivate the seller, but there’s not much they can do to help you recover any money either.
Happy shopping, and don’t let my bad experience scare you off! Just be a bit smarter than I was, and you’ll be fine 🙂
Thanks for letting us know how it turned out, Melissa B. I’m sorry to hear your experience wasn’t a wonderful one. Hopefully your guidelines will help other brides-to-be!