A New Venue
I just discovered a great place to buy and sell handmade arts and crafts. Etsy.com has an amazingly varied collection of artists from all over the world in all different mediums. The set-up is somewhat like eBay, but each artist receives their own storefront free-of-charge and listings only cost 10 cents apiece plus a 3.5% commission. Listings stay up for six months instead of a week and there is a built in system for contacting the artist and/or commissioning pieces. The other huge advantage to artists is that the site is specifically geared towards people looking for hand-made art.
For a whopping $2.00 and 3 hours, I made the plunge and set up my own little shop. You can check it out at trpottery.etsy.com. I'm starting out with mostly small items--necklaces and cups. As I see what sells, I can expand my listings.
