Mini Keychain Wallets and more

Mini Keychain Wallets

Hello, 

Last month I made these small keychain wallets! They are so much fun to make and are my preferred mood booster project. The fabrics are all from my stash! These wallets are handy to keep small things like cards, cash, coins, lipstick, gum, etc. 

I love to keep small wallets like these handy for gifting.  Sometimes my SIL or my MIL needs small gifts for their friends too. 

 

Umbrella Print Wallet

Small Yellow Flower Wallet

I used the Twinnie Pouch pattern to make these wallets and also made a workflow video for it.  This is a very easy and quick project to sew. You can check the full video tutorial HERE but if you need a written tutorial, it's available on my website. 

Speaking about patterns, I recently increased the price for the patterns on my ETSY SHOP only. I was actually reluctant to do it, but then the cost of running a small business on Etsy is also increasing. There were some changes for Etsy sellers in India, and now it is mandatory to use Etsy Payment.  That means, all the money goes to Etsy first and Etsy will send us the balance after deducting all the fees. It was a bit confusing in the first few days and one thing I miss is my daily Paypal deposit! 

Red Riding Hood Keychain Wallet

Pink Patchwork Wallet

Beige floral Wallet

Besides that, I was also busy revamping my website. The new Ecwid instant site is perfect. Nowadays, I feel a bit apprehensive to learn new things. But I never thought that converting to the new site was so easy!  I love a website that is simple to operate, be it on a desktop or on a mobile app. 

Now, for the last couple of months, I have also been using Shopify, especially for my patterns.  The main reason is to connect the shop to my YouTube channel. Setting up Shopify is a bit of a challenge for me.  I rant ehm talk about it HERE.  But that's of course from my point of view. 

Well, having your own website is not as glamorous as it looks, especially if you are running your small business solo! For now, I like it the way it is. I tried to make more ready-to-ship wallets and pouches in between orders.

The Keychain Wallets are also available in my ETSY SHOP. 

Thank you for stopping by! 

Happy Sewing

Elvira

Linking up to these wonderful BLOGS

Branching out from Etsy

The past few weeks, I've been busy setting up new platform for my shop. I've been selling in Etsy for a couple of years but with the ever changing Etsy policy it is getting tougher for sellers outside USA to get (even) a view unless we pay for Etsy Promoted Ads. 

Etsy promoted ads gives benefits, but I see that you should have a higher budget (which I can't afford) which bring your shop to the first search pages.

Well, there are SEO thingy and keywords, etc which turned out to be a little help (or no help at all) if you don't use promoted ads.

And also the "shop local" policy really have impact on Seller outside US.

Another reason was I've been waiting for Etsy to introduce INR in their default currency but don't see that coming. While I get many inquiries from India, the USD price tag deter them from Etsy. Indian shoppers feel more comfortable shopping in their own currency and using Bank Transfer as mode of payment. 

I really wish Etsy take a hint from Amazon. 

There are many Etsy-like platform coming up in India, the problem with these marketplace is they withhold the payment to seller. For big player, a couple of bucks won't hurt them, but for us who make one product at a time and getting the money weekly or three quarterly is too much. 

With that in mind, I decided to sign up with Ecwid  and have my shop everywhere. You can shop from Facebook or from  my new shop blog. What I like most is it's user friendly and it has a FREE plan. I started with free plan then decide to upgrade. 

I will still be selling in Etsy. Ecwid is easier for me to connect with local shoppers and also with Ecwid I can offer a less price since I don't have to pay for the fees that Etsy charges. 

Please come and visit my SHOP and wish me a lot of good luck ^^. 

Happy Sewing

photo credits : from various source in the internet