[vc_row][vc_column][vc_message]Niche : Home and Living
Shop link : https://www.etsy.com/shop/Odywood
Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/odywoodurunleri
Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/odywoodurunleri
Website : https://www.odywood.com[/vc_message][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
Tell us something about yourself, how did you get started, do you consider yourself a crafter, maker, artist…
We are the Odywood… We are an assembly of crafters, makers, and artists. Our Odywood story which started with the idea of using wood and wood logs in decorative designs continued with producing creative and next-generation designs from the woods with different stories given by nature and artfully handcrafted metals. Since the foundation, we have been processing wood and metal to produce new, non-repetitive, unique, and inspiring designs as our main mission. Ladywood designs have attracted both domestic and worldwide interests because of producing different, unique, and prominent furniture and decoration products. Our brand continues to produce innovative designs by the hands of our craftsmen with years of experience and knowledge in wood and metalwork.
How did you discover Etsy? Did you have any previous experience in selling handmade products? Why did you start selling online?
We have received a wonderful reaction from social media, which made it impossible for us to not see the interest in our resin products. To find a high-quality epoxy resin design is a very rare possibility. Our customers have seen our difference and showed a positive reaction to our designs. Of course, we sell products from other channels like our website, but the users of Etsy are all different. They care about handcrafts and high quality.
What products do you sell, what type of materials are used in your creations, how do you design your products, what makes your products stand out?
Definitely transparent resin tables! To make transparent tables are quite difficult compared to other handcrafts related to woodwork. To get the full transparency and high-gloss finishing make it unique and rare to find. Our customers know very well that we guarantee the diamond shine and glass-a-like transparency.
How was your experience in learning to craft, are you self-taught or did you have a mentor, how long did it take for you to be satisfied with your creations?
We live and work in the Aegean district. We have transferred the best craftsmen in this area and started our workshop. All the people working with us have different talents and they stand out in their profession. We learned a lot from each other. Also, there is one more key to learn this craft: To spend years, a lot of investment, and a lot of effort. That’s how we gained our craft.
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What was your original goal when you opened up an Etsy shop? What impacted your decision to start selling online? Do you consider online selling as a side-job, full-time job, or extra income to pay for your hobby?
Online selling of epoxy resin tables is our full-time job. We are professionals and focused 100% on resin products. Our original goal when we opened up our Etsy shop was to reach easier to the market in the USA. Etsy made us visible and the people are now every they can find Odywood for the highest quality epoxy tables.
Did you have any fears or reservations before opening up your Etsy shop? Were you worried about profitability or product competitiveness? What are some concerns and questions you had before you got started? How did you overcome them?
We had concerns to deliver epoxy resin tables to our customer’s door. When we figured out the ways to work with international shipping operators like DHL, TNT/FedEx, etc… Everything has become easier. Now, we are able to deliver our product all over the world and we deliver to right to our customer’s home.
How long did it take for you to get your first sale? Did you ever think you would make a lot of sales in the first year? What was the goal you were hoping for? How many sales an average you get per week?
We have received our first order quite quickly. From the first days, we received a lot of messages from all over the world. Our expectations were not that high and fast for direct sales abroad. The customers have seen and appreciated the quality of Odywood products. The designs stood out quickly. We have always seen the positive reactions in our conversations.
Do you have a job outside Etsy? If not, are you able to commit full-time to online selling? How does your typical day look like? How do you manage time?
Etsy is not the only channel we use for our sales, but we can easily say it is the most important one. Our workshop and office work full-time for our wood and resin furniture. All our team is focused and determined to Ladywood. We care about timing so when needed our team is always ready for extra hours. Our workshop has our wood warehouse as well. When our customers request to see the exact wood pieces for their epoxy resin tables, we are able to present them with the exact pieces. Our daily life is always around wood in our workshop. We are so happy to spend our time in a work-related to nature.
How does your manufacturing process look like for e.g. your best selling product? Do you create products ahead of the orders? Do you customize your products, if so how? What are the tools that you are using in the manufacturing process?
Since wood material that is used in epoxy table and epoxy coffee table designs, wood pieces, and slices processed without spoiling its natural form, each table or coffee table has a different design and appearance. Since the furniture and designs, we produce with epoxy are made to order, one of the most curious questions of our customers is how will the table or coffee table we purchase look like? After the product price is determined according to your order details and your order is received, every stage of production is offered to our customers, and whichever of the alternatives we offer you, the production proceeds through this selection. With the information we have received from our customers, we select the most suitable trees from our strong tree stock with numerous different shapes, and offer to our customers the array that we think will be the most harmonious and stylish. This stage is the most important stage of the table or coffee table. Because about 80% will have a similar look when your table is finished. Our customers can be comfortable at this stage because it will not tire us to find the most suitable alternative for this special table that you will use for a lifetime. The next stage is one of the stages that shows how the logs you have chosen for the epoxy table will look in epoxy. At this stage, our customers will be able to see the color and surface vein patterns of the trees they have chosen in epoxy casting will be clear. After the epoxy casting is completed, the most important stages of production are proceeding to sand and polishing processes. These stages are the most important stages that determine the quality of the epoxy table and the transparency rate. Each manufacturer uses its own special techniques for epoxy table polishing stages and casting stages. We use our own special techniques for maximum brightness and transparency in our productions.
What is the biggest impact on the profitability of your shop? How expensive are the materials you use? How do you price your products?
As we only use the highest quality materials in resin products, changes in material costs affect us directly. However, we do not step back from using only the first-class products in epoxy and wood furniture. We supply our materials from different countries and we are always open to global effects. We keep our prices at the minimum level for customer satisfaction.
What inspires you when you’re creating? How do you get ideas for new products? What are some methods or tools you use to get creative?
The furniture industry, one of the most important sectors in the world, continued its production with designs similar to each other of different brands without major changes for many years. In the last 4-5 years, a new style that guided the decoration and furniture design with a big attack has created a revolution by dividing it into arms. Natural and processed logs, woods, tree branches, tree roots, and many pieces of different tree species, each of them began to take part in decoration projects by designing unique and unique products. While the ideas about this new decoration style were fresh, a second revolution was experienced with epoxy material that many people have not heard of before. Also about epoxy designs, Our brand Odywood, one of the pioneers of this new style, has drawn intense interest by producing innovative designs that inspire home and places in a short time. Tree stumps, epoxy, and a unique design with our emerging metalworking ago after Turkey began seeing interest from Europe and America. We are waiting for everyone in Odywood who is looking for a difference in decoration with this neo rustic furniture, which is born from the reinterpretation of rustic style with modern lines.
Do you ship your product internationally? How do you handle postage pricing? What is the average time it takes from the order to the delivery? Do you use free shipping? If so, why? How do you package your products?
One of the most important processes in Odywood’s quality standards is the logistics process. Wooden products go through many stages and various checks before shipping. Natural wood and epoxy products, which have been completed, are in the final quality control. At this stage, it is checked one more time whether the finished product complies with Odywood quality standards. The products that succeed in passing this rigorous control pass to the next stage, the wrapping process. The first step of the packaging process is the hugging phase. It is wrapped by wrapping it with fine packaging materials such as stretch film, kraft paper, and mattresses according to the product features. This is just the beginning of the furniture packaging process. Then the packaging process continues with the thick wrapping process. Packages wrapped with balloon packaging, which is also called pıtpıt, can also be covered with a second layer of balloon packaging, depending on the need. At this stage, strength is increased by using high-quality duct tapes. It can also be wrapped with a layer of stretch film in packages that will be needed. The most important point of the bubble packaging and furniture packaging process is the quality of the packaging material. As per Odywood’s quality standards, it uses only the most durable and strong packaging materials. In products that will damage each other by contact with each other or need more protection against external factors, package durability is also increased by using styrofoam. Product accessories or spare parts are added to the package after this step. The boxing process begins after all these packaging stages, especially in foreign furniture shipments. Packages are carefully placed in a wooden case in a packaged form. With the styrofoam after the products placed in this case, the product is protected from external factors and the contact of the solid box with the product. The box made of wood is closed by screwing. In the next step, the information we want to share with our customer, our custom message, user manual, invoice, and waybill is added to the product package. All notes about the sensitive transportation of the product are visibly stuck on the package for the cargo workers to see. At the other stage, after the packaging, the final status of the packages is photographed and recorded and the product is ready for shipment. All information about the shipment provided by the cargo/logistics company is shared with our customers instantly and the shipment is tracked.
Are you worried about competitors? Does it impact your business in any way? If there are a lot of similar products, how do you make your own stand out?
Most of the listings on Etsy and social media are made by a few producers. To make an epoxy resin furniture is a difficult job. Most of the sellers are indeed re-sellers. Therefore we are not worried about competitors at all. It does impact our business only in a positive way. Our products are all made by our crew and all the listings in our shop belong to us. We guarantee our quality.
How do you deal with disputes or bad ratings/feedback? How do you manage presale and post-sale communication and customer satisfaction?
We have a guarantee for our products. Our customers have the right to order a new product for free if they are not fully satisfied with their order. We keep communicating with our customers post-sale and listen to their feedback. We ask for their feedback even after months.
Has selling on Etsy changed your life in any way? If so, how? Did you ever think you would get this far with your shop? Have you ever been stressed about dealing with customers and manufacturing products? How did you deal with that?
Selling on Etsy has changed all of our strategies. We always had I our mind to reach international markets, but we were planning to do that with mass sales, most probably via some resellers or international sales agents. However, Etsy cleared our path and connected it to our customers. Now, we are able to communicate and understand the requests of our customers directly.
How important is social media for your shop? What are some common tactics you use to promote your products? Do you spend money on ads outside of Etsy? How do you generate excitement/hype around your products?
We can definitely say that social media is the leading promotion tactic we use since our beginning. We care about the photography of our wood and epoxy furniture to present our designs correctly and in detail. We post almost every day, so our new design always shows up initially on social media. Followers of Odywood see our latest epoxy designs as first priority. We also always use ads on Etsy.
What are some things you don’t like about Etsy? If you could talk to the CEO of Etsy what recommendations would you tell him to improve sellers and customer satisfaction?
We wish we could upload all of our customization options and our customers could see the custom price themselves. At Odywood we have hundreds of design options. This feature could minimize the time before the order has given.
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What are some things you did to set your shop for success on Etsy? What is one lesson you learned the hard way?
We ask dozens of questions to our customers to understand their needs precisely. Custom made epoxy furniture have hundreds of combinations of design and to stay in the same line with our customer is crucially important. All of our steps in production continues only with the design confirmation of our customer. No surprises at all!
What piece of advice would you give to new or established sellers or those considering selling on Etsy? How can they avoid beginner mistakes?
They should have a continuous and sincere connection with their potential customers. Etsy makes it so easy to connect to people and communication is the key to custom handcrafts. They should really understand what customers need, even when the customers don’t know what they need.
Anything you wish to add, feel free to do so here. We value your opinion
As Odywood we guarantee the quality of our resin designs and we promise to deliver a brand new table when our customers are not satisfied with the product received. If you are interested in epoxy resin products, please feel free to contact us anytime.
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