Etsy Packaging and Cheesecloth Ghosts

Sample of some of my ties for sale in my Etsy shop.

I’ve spent a little time fixing up my Etsy store, and as a result I’ve made my first few sales over the past couple months. It’s so exciting to send your hard work to faraway lands like Bellefonte, Pennsylvania and LA—I’ve gone Hollywood already.

I make and sell ties and bow ties in my store, and I’ve finally taken the time to shoot some product photos during a summer camping trip where I forced a modeling career on myself and my boyfriend—we needed a few beers to truly express our inner beast.

I think the product photos are the most important part to selling your goods, and as a non-photographer, I’m still trying to figure this part out.

Luckily, Etsy has a plethora of resources for all its shop owners including tips on taking effective photos, ideas for packaging, advice on pricing and more.

I found the most difficult part in this Etsy business to be the packaging. I don’t want to spend a ton of money on it, but I believe it’s important for the recipient to feel confident that they’ve made a good investment before they even see the product. I settled for simplicity and used cardboard craft boxes, raffia and card stock tags with a typewriter font detail. I think and hope that the result will make people smile when they see their name printed off an old typewriter and the product neatly wound and nestled in the curls of the raffia.

Perhaps I haven’t found my final packaging solution but the beauty of Etsy is that customers are able to provide feedback on the product so I’ll stick to my current strategy until the people speak against me.

Now that I’ve gotten the shameless self-promotion out of the way, I’d like to leave you with a super fun Halloween craft for the whole family. The project is, of course, authored by the Martha Stewart family and this video gives you a great walk-through of the whole process. Plus, it’s always fun to watch Martha get all snarky with her crafting employees.

For the cheesecloth ghost, you can either use cheesecloth, gauze, muslin or a plain white sheet. I used cheesecloth which lends to a spooky, translucent effect. in the end, I used a scissors to cut slits all around the edges and then pulled the pieces apart so our ghost didn’t look so perfect.

In the video, you’ll see Martha uses coffee to give the ghost an antique spray tan and she also uses a brush to rough up the material. Get creative with your ghost; give him googly eyes or high heels if your too scared of the mysterious floating presence.

Please post your Etsy store links and any seller advice in the comments section below. Shop local Milwaukee! And Happy Halloween.