Etsy vent

blabla89

I've been struggling to come up with a handful of Christmas gifts for FI (who is notoriously hard to shop for) so that he would have some to open with my family on Christmas morning. I finally found the last one, a monogrammed cutting board from Etsy with our names and wedding date, and I was so excited because I knew he would love it.

It arrived last week, and it was absolutely beautiful, except it was broken in half because it was shipped in just an envelope. I sent a message to the seller and got a replacement right away, but the new one is a piece of junk. The color of the wood is different, and it's uneven and mottled looking, which obscures some of the letters in the monogram. It's also not as smooth as the first one, and there's a scratch in the middle of the monogram. It looks so bad that I would rather glue the broken one back together than give FI this ugly thing. So I asked the seller for a refund (I don't want to try another replacement) and they're denying that there's any problem with it, saying it's supposed to be that way and they can't see the scratch.

So much for having my Christmas shopping all done. I know this is a FWP. I know Christmas will still be great without the stupid cutting board. But darn it, I was so excited about this thing and now I'm just irritated. Thanks for letting me vent.

hellohkb

I would leave a review with several pictures of the original cutting board and the ugly replacement. I had a terrible etsy experience with my first ever etsy purchase about 9 years ago and am so disappointed that I never left a bad review.

Sugargirl1019

Ugh that sucks! Leave reviews and maybe find a different vendor for a similar item, and use the wood for a fire.

dcbride86

OMG that sucks!!  I've been really lucky and had pretty great Etsy experiences so far (knock on wood).  I'm sorry!!!

RebeccaFlower

Bummer I had a similar issue come up with a tree skirt I ordered last year. The seller was super super when I said I thought she used the wrong thread color (it's like lime green as opposed to forest green). Most sellers really are fabulous, in my expirience.

novella1186

That's so annoying. I'm sorry that happened, I definitely understand the disappointment and frustration with that kind of stuff! 

I usually have a good experience shopping on Etsy, but several months ago I ordered some hair pins and they never showed up. I tried contacting the seller a few times and she didn't bother to respond so I had to "open a case." It became this whole annoying ordeal. All I wanted was for her to send the thing I paid for, or to just give me my money back (and this was over three months after I had ordered and paid). Finally she ended up sending them, and also sent me TWO nasty messages on Etsy. Um... it's not my fault you can't do your job. WTF are you mad at me for? 

It just takes one bad seller to ruin the experience  

loveislouder

Ya'll are making me nervous because I just ordered our cake topper from Etsy.

Bubblegum5586

blabla89 what store so I make sure I use a differnt one!

abl13

I have always had ok experiences on Etsy but I have a list of items that I was going to buy on Black Friday in hopes that there would be a sale or free shipping and I logged in today and noticed that some of the prices randomly increased >20%. On principle I will not buy them now so I have to rethink my gifts.

I just bought a vintage ceramic Christmas tree and it took >2 weeks to ship and when it arrived it was missing some lights which was not disclosed. So annoying.

kat1114

bubblegum1309 said:

blabla89 what store so I make sure I use a differnt one!

I bought my mom a cutting board in the cutout out of our home state on Etsy. A few weeks later I saw it on Amazon (from the same Etsy seller) for a fraction of the price, so you might want to check Amazon first just in case!

hellohkb

loveislouder said:

Ya'll are making me nervous because I just ordered our cake topper from Etsy.

Don't worry- The majority of Etsy sellers are great. It's the select few ones that really stink. If they have good seller feedback, you probably have little to worry about.

novella1186

hellohkb said:

loveislouder said:

Ya'll are making me nervous because I just ordered our cake topper from Etsy.

Don't worry- The majority of Etsy sellers are great. It's the select few ones that really stink. If they have good seller feedback, you probably have little to worry about.

SIB

I second this. I know I posted about a bad experience, but I order stuff from there a LOT -- anything from antiques to wedding stuff to random gifts for people-- and I've only ever had that one bad experience. A lot of the time the stuff I order exceeds my expectations, and 99% of the sellers I've messaged have been extremely nice. We just ordered our wedding invites from there, as a matter of fact, and the lady was awesome to work with. 

littlemushroom

loveislouder said:

Ya'll are making me nervous because I just ordered our cake topper from Etsy.

We got our cake topper from Etsy and everything was great. It even arrived weeks earlier than it said.

LakeR2014

loveislouder said:

Ya'll are making me nervous because I just ordered our cake topper from Etsy.

@loveislouder - do not worry at all!  We got ours off Etsy, it was handmade and absolutely perfect.  It was not traditional, and I was worried about how my traditional parents would think about it, they absolutely loved it and said it was my H and I perfectly.   Gave that vendor the best review I could think of.

plainjane0415

I have had good and bad experiences with Etsy.  The best advice I can give is to leave a review. I had to really stay on top of a seller to ensure that one of my items arrived on time... well... it arrived on time, but was in terrible shape. At that point, what else was I going to do?

novella1186

plainjane0415 said:

I have had good and bad experiences with Etsy.  The best advice I can give is to leave a review. I had to really stay on top of a seller to ensure that one of my items arrived on time... well... it arrived on time, but was in terrible shape. At that point, what else was I going to do?

I agree with this. I pretty much depend on reviews to see if the seller is a good one or not, and to try and figure out if the product is what I expect it to be/worth paying for. 

I also love leaving reviews for awesome products and/or awesome sellers, because they deserve a little bit of recognition. I make sure to be honest and as detailed as possible, and also leave negative reviews if necessary because other buyers deserve to know what they might be getting themselves into.