If you have an Etsy shop and are wondering if it’s possible to open a second Etsy shop, or even how to tell if that’s a good move for you, you’re in the right place!

Can I Have More Than 1 Etsy Shop?

Absolutely you can! In fact, there is no set limit to the number of Etsy shops a person can own. You could, in theory, have 627 Etsy shops if you wanted. Don’t to that, though. That would be a silly idea.

Today I am going to talk about the reasons for and logistics of running multiple Etsy shops. I personally have 3 Etsy shops and it works well for me. We’ll get into that in a bit, though.

Why would you want more than one Etsy shop?

There are a few different reasons for this.

The main reason for wanting to open a second (or third, or even 627th) Etsy shop is to allow you to target a different niche.

Here’s an example:

Let’s say you’ve got one Etsy shop up and running selling handmade scarves for women, and it’s ticking away nicely. Orders are coming in regularly and you feel happy and confident that you are doing all the right things to keep your particular target audience happy. But you want to introduce a new range of men’s wallets, which has a very different target audience to your existing shop. That’s where a second Etsy shop can be useful. Your first Etsy shop attracts a certain type of customer, it is set up to appeal to them and uses all the right keywords, but your new audience needs to be targeted in a different way. You can set up a new shop with a new name, products, photography style and keywords.

Can you see how it is helpful in this situation to open a new shop? If, however, the new product range was something that would be aimed at the same target audience as the first, like women’s bags or scrunchies, it would be worth adding them to your existing shop as you already have a steady flow of your ideal customers.

Another reason for wanting a second Etsy shop is to reduce risk. We’ve all heard the horror stories about shops being suspended without warning. Although it is rare, it does happen sometimes. Having a second shop is a good backup plan, but, again, you want it to be something different to your first shop. You really don’t want to be competing against yourself.

How To Set Up A Second Etsy Shop

Each Etsy shop has to have its own email address. This in itself can be a bit of a juggling act, but once things are set up, it gets easier. You can still use the same banking details in more than one Etsy shop, and you still have to fill in all your seller information on the new shop.

You do need to be completely clear with customers about your other Etsy shop(s). That means including links to your other Etsy shop(s) in the “About” sections of each shop you own.

How To Run Multiple Etsy Shops

The easiest way to be logged in to multiple Etsy shops on your computer is to have different browsers for each one. Trust me on this one! It is such a pain logging in and out of Etsy each time you want to check something or print an order. Different browsers is a total game changer.

When it comes to the seller app, it’s pretty easy to switch between different shops. Simply go to “More” (bottom right) and then “Switch Account” (top right).

How To Decide Whether Another Etsy Shop Is The Right Decision?

This one is a bit of a ‘how long is a piece of string’ sort of question. It’s such an individual thing- only you can really know if you’re ready. I have, however, created a helpful decision tree diagram to help you with this. Simply click the download button below.

When it comes to deciding it the time is right, you ultimately need to think about how much work you put into running your main Etsy store, and imagine doubling it (at least). If this thought doesn’t scare you, you have a new niche and product range, and you feel like you’ve pretty much nailed your first Etsy store, then a new Etsy shop may be the right thing for you.

About My 3 Etsy Shops

As promised, I thought I’d share a bit about my experiences running multiple Etsy shops.

As you probably know, our main (first) Etsy shop is our laser cut greetings cards shop, Pogofandango. Here we sell luxury greetings cards for the most special of occasions.

Our second shop has a very different vibe, for a very different audience. Papercut Card SVGs is the shop, and we sell digital downloads for crafters looking to make their own papercut cards. We set this up because we were being asked on an almost daily basis whether we sold our artwork. Initially we told people no as we were very protective over our artwork and didn’t want to let anyone have it. But we eventually decided that creating a new, separate range for this very purpose would be a good move. We are on about 3k orders at the moment, so yes, it has been worth it.

And our newest Etsy shop is a place for us to sell wooden hearts and stars made from our offcuts of painted wood. This was simply a way to make a bit of extra money and stop our waste wood going in the bin, but it has been pretty successful and we sometimes have to paint whole sheets just to cut hearts and stars for orders -Oops!

As you can see, each shop has a very different purpose, different products and different target audiences. I do find it hard to promote the 2 extra Etsy shops, so I haven’t done a huge amount them, but that’s on my to-do list.

Summing Up

There you go, that’s my take on setting up and running multiple Etsy shops. It can be worth it, but it also is a lot of hard work. I would say that until your first shop is bringing in regular sales and you have completely nailed creating content for your very specific target audience, you definitely shouldn’t be thinking about adding a new shop into the mix. Get your first shop running so smoothly that you can ease off a smidge with that one and free yourself up enough to set up the second Etsy shop.

In other news, I am seriously considering a 4th Etsy shop, so I’ll keep you all posted if/when it does happen!