Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Cargoh.com and Windows Live Writer

After all that yammering about Artfire last week (I did sign up for the free option), I ended up going a completely different direction and opened up a shop on cargoh.com.  Never heard of it?  Don’t worry, neither had I until a week or so ago.

10 19 10 cargoh homepage

Cargoh is based in Vancouver and is a new marketplace still in beta.  They are evidently trying to cultivate a hip, indie vibe.  Now I’ve never categorized myself as the hipster type, but I was sucked in because the shops are juried – you have to apply and be approved to sell on Cargoh.  I can’t resist a challenge and I just HAD to know if my stuff was good enough to pass.  Right now Cargoh has no monthly fees; the only fee is 3.5% of sales.

I applied late Friday night and got my approval letter early this morning.  I set up my shop, which was easy enough – I used some of my information from Etsy and just redesigned my banner and avatar for Cargoh’s size specs (which includes MASSIVE shop banners, btw).  I have a few listings up now and I’ll probably add a few more this week.

10 19 10 etsy shop 10 19 10 cargoh shop

For comparison’s sake, these are the front pages of my Cargoh shop and my Etsy shop.  The Twitter feed and Facebook widget on the right side of the shop on Cargoh are kinda nice, and I like the overall look of the site.  It’s way better than the slightly janky feel over at Artfire.  I guess Cargoh REALLY annoyed some Etsy sellers last month by closing down some established shops – if you want more on that story, check out this Etsy forum thread.

I’ll keep you updated on how things go at Cargoh.  If you’re interested in the listing process (which is pretty simple) or any other specifics about starting up a shop, leave me a comment and I’ll give you more details.
This is also my first post using Windows Live Writer, which is a free program you can find here.  It’s basically set up like a word processor.  You type up the post, add links and pics, and export it to Blogger.  I’ve been looking for a better blogging solution because adding pictures and links on Blogger sometimes makes me want to stab myself with a pencil. 

I’ve got loads of new stuff to work on this week.  The results are in for the Epi Pen case product testing, so I’ve got my redesign all sketched and ready to be sewn.  I’m also working on some reusable snack bags and a cute hanging hair stuff organizer for the bajillion barrettes Bridget has accumulated.  Have a great week everyone!

7 comments:

  1. Hi Sam,

    Thanks for the great write up, you have a lot of good info in your post. We hope that you are happy at cargoh and if you ever need anything or have any questions you can email me at cariann@cargoh.com. Welcome aboard!

    Cheers,
    Cariann

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for stopping by Cariann! I'm looking forward to being on Cargoh - I think it looks great and has loads of potential. Good luck to you guys, I hope it's super successful!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hey Sam, that Cargoh site looks pretty cool- let us know how that turns out for you.

    On a side note: how do you insert pics of a full webpage like you did with sew mama sew (congrats, by the way!), etsy and cargoh? I've never been able to figure that out!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Here's how I do it, Emily, but it might be the long way!

    When I'm on the page I want to copy, I click ctrl+prnt scrn, then right click on a word document and click "paste". The screen shot should copy into the word doc. Next, I drag it from word into a blank Photoshop document, resize it, crop it, and save it as a jpeg. If you want better instructions, let me know! Maybe I'll write a post about it sometime.

    I have a sneaking suspicion there's probably a way to skip the pasting the picture into word and instead paste it right into Photoshop, but I don't know what it is.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ugh- don't have Photoshop. Wonder if it'll work in Picassa? Anyway, I'll try to mess around with that technique- thanks for getting back to me so quickly:)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Here's how I do it, Emily, but it might be the long way!

    When I'm on the page I want to copy, I click ctrl+prnt scrn, then right click on a word document and click "paste". The screen shot should copy into the word doc. Next, I drag it from word into a blank Photoshop document, resize it, crop it, and save it as a jpeg. If you want better instructions, let me know! Maybe I'll write a post about it sometime.

    I have a sneaking suspicion there's probably a way to skip the pasting the picture into word and instead paste it right into Photoshop, but I don't know what it is.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Hi Sam,

    Thanks for the great write up, you have a lot of good info in your post. We hope that you are happy at cargoh and if you ever need anything or have any questions you can email me at cariann@cargoh.com. Welcome aboard!

    Cheers,
    Cariann

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for commenting - I love to hear from you!

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