Etsy Seller Interview with David of RedHeronLighthouse

How RedHeronLighthouse got started

Introduce your Etsy shop and tell us your story. How did you begin and decide on what to sell on Etsy, and how do you create your products?

I once shared my home with George, a Golden Retriever who defied the typical canine stereotype. He resembled more of a cartoon caricature than a real dog, complete with fetlocks. He also possessed a knack for stealing items from pockets, serenading me with howls whenever I played the harmonica and ‘talked’ a lot in a grumbly sort of way, never more so than when I left him alone for too long. Despite his breed, George never quite grasped the concept of retrieving, rendering the term "Golden Retriever" rather ironic. His idea of play involved me chasing him for a ball he refused to fetch.

I’m introducing you to him because he was the muse behind RedHeronLighthouse, the card shop I started in 2016 as a hobby, which featured—among other things—retriever-themed cards. However, card-making was very labor-intensive, and after George's passing, my creative drive waned. Life’s demands pulled me in other directions, and the shop sat dormant for a few years, with a modest 61 sales and 25 five-star reviews—something that later proved useful.

In 2023, I enrolled in a UX Design course, which, somewhat unexpectedly, led me back to the shop through AI exploration. As an illustrator, AI-generated art was the last thing I thought I'd ever embrace, but the course opened my mind. I realized that resisting it would only leave me behind. To my surprise, working with AI became both fascinating and creatively fulfilling and although AI creates beautiful images there's usually something wrong or weird about the created image, so I get to edit them which I love doing and as an Illustrator I already have all the skills and tools to do an excellent job.

Initially, in 2024, I opened another shop selling AI-generated digital wall art after watching a video that made it sound like a goldmine, especially in the wake of COVID’s impact on the market. But the shop flopped because I was trying to replicate what worked for others rather than doing what felt natural. That’s when I pivoted back to something I truly love: animals doing silly things.

Though RedHeronLighthouse remains a small shop (under 380 listings at the time of writing), we’ve always punched above our weight, and our conversion rate is good (6.5%). I believe that loving what we create translates to our audience, and that makes all the difference. We don't sell wall art but create content for crafters - small bundles of images with a commercial license. It makes much more sense to me to do this, and we’ve just opened a second shop which is going to be a lot less niche called Fussy Crow!

Favorite items

What are your favorite items? What makes these so special? Why do you think these items might be selling well?

I love badgers, even though they’re not the most popular item, and dragons as well, which tend to do better. We also have an Enchanted section that I’m particularly proud of—several people have mentioned they haven’t found anything quite like it on Etsy. Our buyers often share wonderfully imaginative suggestions that take our creations in directions I’d never have thought of, and for that, I’m truly grateful.

Over the festive period, we even had a couple of unexpected bestsellers—the funny thing is, I wasn’t especially taken with them, yet they did incredibly well. At this point, I’ve (mostly) given up trying to predict customer buying patterns—it’s still a complete mystery to me!

I'm quite fond of this one:

Getting sales on Etsy

How long did it take for you to earn your first sale and how do you currently attract customers to your Etsy shop?

It only took about two weeks, which may have been helped by RedHeronLighthouse’s existing reviews and shop history. But I also think the content was just so much better than our first shop—and it was fun, too. By contrast, getting our first sale in the other shop took much longer.

To attract new buyers, I reach out to all our new customers every two weeks, asking if they’d leave a positive review and offering discounts as well. Regular reviews naturally draw people in, and I suspect they also help with Etsy’s algorithm. We don’t use ads or social media, as Etsy already does a great job promoting the shop, but it’s something we might revisit in the future.

Managing RedHeronLighthouse

How do you manage your shop? Are you running solo or do you have any team members? What tools or services do you use to run your shop and how do you handle fulfillment?

There are two of us running RedHeronLighthouse. I handle the creation and editing of images using a mix of AI, Photoshop, and Figma. We offer both PNGs with transparent backgrounds and JPGs. Removing backgrounds from detailed images can be tricky—AI often erases too much, so I spend time restoring lost details. AI-generated images also tend to have odd quirks, so I use Photoshop to clean up mistakes and add missing elements.

We’ve always offered both PNGs and JPGs, assuming most customers preferred transparent backgrounds. However, some of the biggest shops only sell JPGs and do extremely well. With that in mind, our new shop, Fussy Crow, offers only JPGs, which speeds up the listing process significantly.

My partner in crime sometimes creates images but primarily handles the business side—writing listing details, responding to reviews, optimizing SEO with tools like Alura and ChatGPT, and generating tags. Since we only sell digital downloads, we never have to worry about shipping or inventory, making the process much smoother. 

The future of RedHeronLighthouse

What goals do you have for your shop in the future?

I don’t have anything particularly original to say about this—we just want to keep growing, improving, and finding new ways to innovate, whether through the products we offer or the customer service we provide. I’d love to explore junk journaling kits at some point—they’re so imaginative, and the possibilities are endless. We’ve experimented a little, but creating in this genre takes me more time. Maybe once we have a few more listings, maybe next year… or maybe when we finally reach the promised land—wherever and whenever that may be.

Advice for new sellers

What’s your advice for a new seller starting an Etsy shop?

I probably have loads of ideas about this! If you're unsure what to sell, start by finding a shop you admire and think about why you like it—use it as a benchmark. Unless you have a clear vision from the start, try emulating a shop you respect, at least in the beginning. Once you find your rhythm, your instincts will naturally guide you toward your own direction. Trust them. Trends matter, but sometimes going off-piste can pay off, too.

It’s important to sell something you feel connected to, but when you're still figuring things out, using successful shops as templates can be really helpful. There are also great tools to lighten the load—ChatGPT can help with listing descriptions, while Alura (and similar tools) can show you what’s selling well, suggest effective tags, and optimize your listings for Etsy’s algorithm. Take the time to get this right, and make sure your images are strong—after all, you wouldn’t buy something that didn’t look great, would you? Once you nail this, you can reuse the same template for future listings.

If you’re unsure what to include in descriptions, check out what other shops are doing. If you like something, use its structure as a guide and have ChatGPT rewrite it. The same goes for shop policies and FAQs—look at what works elsewhere and adapt it. We also add videos to listings, which cycle through product images. Etsy claims this helps with ranking, and while it takes extra time, I believe customers appreciate it.

We also wrote an About section, though whether it’s essential is debatable. When we reopened RedHeronLighthouse, there was talk of shops getting shut down for low-quality content or uploading too much too fast, so we played it safe—dotting all the I’s, crossing all the T’s, and listing slowly (one item per day at first, then two). Some advice suggested this was good for Etsy’s algorithm, but plenty of successful shops have skyrocketed to over 1,000 listings in under a year without an About section, policies, or videos—yet they thrive. So, ultimately, it’s your call!

A quick note on getting your Star Seller badge—it helps! Keep customer service top-notch. If you mess up, offer a freebie to make up for it (even if it wasn’t your fault). Respond to queries quickly—ideally within 24 hours—and follow up with review requests, offering discounts as an incentive.

Finally, temper your expectations and celebrate every milestone, no matter how small. Your first sale might take two months, which is completely normal—but if you’ve set things up well, it could be sooner. If little happens in the first 3–6 months, don’t panic; just keep going. Commit to at least a year before deciding if it’s worth it. While some shops strike gold overnight (we saw one that opened in January and sold over 1,000 items in its first month!), that’s the exception, not the rule. Success takes time, but if you stick with it, you’ll give yourself the best chance to succeed.