Etsy Had Me Over For Lunch!

Back in July, seven members of Etsy came to visit me in my studio.  One of the questions they asked me was what did my parents think about my business.  I told them that while my dad is very supportive, my mom takes issue with the fact that I can't have lunch with coworkers.  This surprised them, and to my delight a few weeks later I received an invitation to join them for lunch at Etsy, which they call "Eatsy."

Etsy is headquartered in Dumbo, a very cool neighborhood only ten minutes walking distance from my Downtown Brooklyn jewelry studio.  I knew I was in for an amazing meal when I saw the menu, and the salad was actually one of the best salad's I've ever had in my life.

Better than the salad, however, was when Ali let me know that she'd acquired a selfie stick and had sent a company wide email to have everyone at Etsy come to lunch so I could prove to my mom wrong. This is the first time I've ever used a selfie stick, and I'm glad it was for revenge against my mom.  That is a smile of vengeance!!!!!

After lunch, Bernadette and Ali gave me a tour of the office.  It's a great, open, industrial space with cool decor.  All of the Etsy employees get a budget to decorate their desks with items purchased from Etsy sellers, so there's crazy stuff everywhere.  My favorite was a the three armed sweater hanging from the ceiling.  There's also a cozy nook area that looks like if an enchanted forest was multiplied by handmade quilts and beanbags.

My favorite Etsy office feature is their live stream screen of all the keywords that people are searching for on Etsy.  Since I spend a lot of time thinking about SEO, it was so addicting to see the search terms as they came in - "daft punk helmet" was not the weirdest thing that popped up!  Shows how being specific in your metadescription and tags is important!

They finished the tour by allowing me to use the Etsy photobooth, which was great because I didn't have any professional headshots yet.

Overall I had a great time at Eatsy.  I think next time I'm going to tell them that my mom doesn't like that I have to pay for my own health insurance and see how they respond to that!