A couple years ago, Etsy partnered with the city of Rockford, Illinois to develop an entrepreneur training program for the “Etsy economy”. It’s called the Etsy Craft Entrepreneurship Program.
In 2015, Etsy is a public company, and the program is in many more locations now, including Dallas; Watsonville, California; Chattanooga; Albany; Newark, New York City; Albuquerque; St. Petersburg; Oldham, UK; Poole, UK; Madison; Detroit; Austin; and Santa Fe.
Now it’s expanding into five new cities: Cookeville, Tennessee; Hazard, Kentucky; Atlantic City; Cleveland; and Ft. Lauderdale. That brings the total to 19 cities.
“As Etsy celebrates its tenth anniversary this June, it’s a perfect time to reflect on all the ways our seller community has helped make Etsy what it is today,” says Etsy’s Graham Ashcraft. “In particular, it’s incredible to see so many sellers connecting with their communities and helping Etsy’s Craft Entrepreneurship program continue to expand. By sharing their experiences of starting and running their Etsy shops, seasoned sellers have helped more than 550 creative individuals from underserved communities move forward on their own entrepreneurial journeys.”
“Teaching gives you such an appreciation for where you’ve been and where you ended up, for where you’ve found yourself as a seller and for all the mistakes you made along the way. It gives you such a sense of pride to learn from those mistakes, to be able to share your experience, and to encourage new sellers to put themselves out there,” said Craft Entrepreneurship teacher, Becky Garcia, of dirtsastudio.
In Cookeville, the program will be offered at the Small Business Development Center at Tennessee Tech University. In Hazard it will be at Hazard Community and Technical College. In Atlantic City it will be offered via the Small Business Development Center at Stockton College. In Cleveland, it will be held at the Public Library. It will also be held at Broward County Library in Ft. Lauderdale.
Etsy continues to look for new partners and teachers for the program as the year progresses. If you know of a potential organization in your city, you can let the company know here.
Image via Etsy
