Etsy Seller Interview with William and Hayley of SloClo

How SloClo 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?

Together, we run a t-shirt design and printing shop on Etsy, called SLO-CLO, short for "slow clothing," as opposed to "fast fashion." We wanted to create long-lasting, interesting t-shirts and produce them in a sustainable and climate-conscious way. We use "Earth Positive" t-shirts and recycle all our packaging or use compostable mailers when we can afford them! We are both illustrators and thought it might be nice to share some less commercially viable designs on t-shirts to see if people were into it. And it turns out they were correct!We didn’t have big plans when we opened the shop, but it quite quickly became apparent that we’d be getting many more orders than anticipated. Having a few designs based on popular characters really helped to draw in an audience, which then opened up more people to our original and somewhat unusual designs. Initially, we just launched it as a way to make a little money on the side, but it soon became almost a full-time job—designing, printing, and posting to keep up with all the orders.

We handprint each design to order and don’t hold piles of back stock that would need space to house and potentially create waste (unsold items having to be disposed of, etc.). Other than a constant small selection of blank t-shirts and sweatshirts, along with the material we need for printing, we don’t hold any stock. The designs are either by myself (Will) or Hayley, and we each have our own styles, so once you get to know the stock, you can usually tell which ones each of us has designed.

Favorite items

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

I’m not sure I have a favorite design, but it’s almost certainly one of Hayley's. I think her "Crying Devil" design is excellent and has always been popular.

Our most successful design is the Ren and Stimpy/Fear and Loathing mashup, and I think that kind of speaks for itself.

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?

Our first sales were to mostly friends and family, who made orders nearly as soon as we opened. Then we made it onto the Etsy homepage, which opened us up to a much wider audience. We started getting orders from people we didn’t know, and everyone was leaving great reviews. Approximately 2 months in Hayley thought it would be a good time to do a bit of paid promotion across our social media platforms, and initially that seemed to really work—but we never promote these days. The platforms where you can pay for promoted posts used to create a lot of traffic, but as time went on and algorithms changed and the promotions got more costly due to market saturation, etc., it just wasn’t worth it for us. So now we just rely on thousands of five-star reviews and let the traffic arrive organically. Sales have decreased significantly as a result, but the shop continues to operate without our intervention. which is great because we both have full-time jobs. 

Managing SloClo

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?

We both manage the shop. Hayley does most of the online stuff, listing and keeping the website up to date (the website is directly linked to our Etsy shop, and all orders go through Etsy). And I do all the printing, packaging, and posting. - We did use printed postage labels at one point when we were getting a lot of orders per week, but now I just hand-write everything onto stick labels and fill each order by hand, including a small unique thank you illustration in every parcel (as we have always done!). 

The future of SloClo

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

We would love for the shop to remain self-sustaining. We’ve used the shop's popularity to raise some money for charity, releasing special designs to directly raise money for certain causes, and I’d like to do more of that, so we can help out where we can. 

Advice for new sellers

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

We launched back in 2016, and the internet has changed an awful lot, even since then, so I’m not sure we’re in the best position to offer advice to new sellers. But my main piece of advice would be to create items you enjoy selling and are passionate about designing. If you go into the process just to make money, then you may well be disappointed. But if you open a shop as a new way to explore and improve your own craft, then it can only be a positive step.