A UK Alternative to Etsy, made for British Makers
We’re a marketplace for extraordinary handmade gifts
by passionate UK-based crafters
A look at Crafter’s Market compared to Etsy
If you’re a UK maker weighing up where to sell your handmade work, you’ve probably already considered Etsy – and you’ve probably also noticed that the answer isn’t as simple as it once was.
Rising fees, a flood of mass-produced items in handmade categories, and a platform that increasingly feels removed from the people actually making things have left a lot of British crafters looking for somewhere else.
That’s where we come in. Crafter’s Market UK is a UK-based marketplace for handmade goods, run from Bristol by a small team who are crafters ourselves. We built it because we wanted the kind of platform we’d want to sell on – one that’s free to join, fair on fees, genuinely focused on handmade, and small enough that the people running it actually answer emails.
If you’re researching Etsy alternatives, here’s what you need to know about us.
What Crafter’s Market UK costs
We try to keep our fee structure simple enough to fit on a page like this:
Free to sign up.
No upfront fee on our Basic membership, giving you the opportunity to try us out.
No listing fees.
List as many products as your membership level allows without having to pay for each listing.
5% commission on what sells
Plus and Premium membership has 0% commission. So the only fee there is the standard payment processing fee of 1.5% + 20p per transaction. No sale, no fee.
No off-site advertising fees
Some platforms automatically opt you into paid ad networks and charge you for the resulting sales. We don’t.
If you’d like to compare the numbers against your current setup, our Fees & Calculator lets you plug in your own product prices and see exactly what you’d pay.
Here are five things that are truly different about selling here compared to other marketplaces available.
We’re UK-only
Every vendor on Crafter’s Market UK is based in the UK. We don’t list mass-produced imports, drop-shipped goods, or resold items – we have a Handmade Policy and we enforce it. For buyers searching specifically for British-made gifts, that means your work isn’t competing for attention with a thousand near-identical wholesale listings. For you, it means a customer base that’s already self-selected for the thing you actually sell.
Smaller marketplace, more visibility per listing
We’re not going to pretend we have Etsy’s traffic. Etsy has tens of millions of buyers globally; we’re a much smaller, growing UK marketplace. The trade-off works like this: on a smaller platform, your work is genuinely visible. New listings reach the homepage. Vendor shops get featured. There’s no algorithm penalising you for not buying ads. Many of our sellers run shops on both Etsy and Crafter’s Market – there’s no reason to choose one or the other if you don’t want to.
Built and run by people who craft
The team behind Crafter’s Market UK are crafters. We’ve been on the seller side of the table, dealt with the same frustrations, and made the same decisions about pricing, packaging, and platforms that you have. When you message support, you’re talking to a person – often one of the owners – not a chatbot or a tier-one outsourced ticket queue.
Tools designed for small handmade businesses
Our vendors decide the features. Recent features include the CMUK Seller: Shop Manager mobile app, AI description assistant, shop analytics, holiday mode for when you need to pause orders, customer discount codes, per-product shipping rules, SMS order alerts – the list goes on.
A tree planted with every order
Through our partnership with Ecologi, every single order placed on Crafter’s Market UK funds a tree being planted. It’s a small thing, but it adds up across the marketplace – and it’s a story your buyers like to hear at checkout.
Plus and Premium subscriptions are available if you want extra advanced features, but the Basic tier is genuinely usable on its own.
The marketplace at a glance in numbers
Crafter’s Market now hosts just over 1700 vendors, each uploading various handmade unique gifts available to buy.
1700+
Vendors
3900+
trees planted
5%
Maximum commission
15+
Seller features
Honest comparison:
Crafter’s Market UK vs Etsy
We’d rather you weighed this up clearly than took our word for it.
The honest summary: If you want sheer scale of audience, Etsy still has more buyers than we do. If you want lower fees, a UK-focused buyer base, vetted handmade-only listings, and a platform that talks to you like a person, that’s where we have something different to offer.
Sign up to an account
- You’re a UK-based maker, designer, or artist
- Your work is genuinely handmade or hand-finished
- You want lower fees and clearer pricing
- You’d rather sell on a smaller platform where your shop gets seen
- You like the idea of being part of a community rather than a number on a dashboard
Let’s save you some time
- You’re not really a UK-based maker. We only accept vendors based in the UK whose work is genuinely made or hand-finished here.
- Want to list items once and never log in again. Marketplaces reward active sellers, and we’ll feature shops that show up.
- Drop-ship from overseas suppliers. Every product on CMUK is made in the UK by the person selling it.
- Expect to make sales without any of your own marketing effort. We promote the marketplace, but the most successful shops also share their own work on social, in newsletters, at fairs.
- You sell vintage or second-hand items.
Positive feedback from sellers using our platform
Just started selling on CMUK what a refreshing change to have the site owners actually care about handmade rather than you know where which is now full of junk!
I’ve had my shop quite a few years now. It’s run by a small but dedicated team who really want to make it the best platform. It’s small at the moment but, with more people joining and selling, it would definitely get the financial boost to make it the best online craft selling platform.
How to start selling on Crafter’s Market UK
Setting up is straightforward and takes about ten minutes:
Apply for a vendor account
Fill in our short application form so we can confirm you’re a UK-based handmade maker.
Set up your shop
Add your shop name, logo, banner, and a short bio. You’ll get your own URL like crafters.market/shop/your-shop-name
List your first products
Add photos, descriptions (use AI-Assist if you want a draft to start from), prices, and shipping options.
Share your shop
Once you’re live, your products are findable on the marketplace and indexed for Google Shopping.
There’s no commitment, no upfront cost, and no obligation to upgrade.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to be based in the UK to sell on Crafter’s Market UK?
Yes. We only accept UK-based vendors. This keeps the marketplace genuinely British-made and means buyers searching for UK handmade gifts find what they’re looking for.
Can I sell on both Etsy and Crafter’s Market UK?
Absolutely. Many of our vendors do. There’s no exclusivity requirement, and managing both is straightforward — though if you do, double-check your stock levels carefully so you don’t oversell.
Is there a minimum number of listings I need to keep up?
No. List one product or list a hundred. There are no listing fees and no minimum activity requirements.
What happens if I don’t make any sales?
You don’t pay anything. Our Basic tier is free to maintain — you only ever pay the 5% commission and payment processing fee when something actually sells.
Can I import my Etsy listings?
Not yet through an automated tool. For now you’d need to recreate listings, though our AI-Assist feature can help draft product descriptions quickly. We’re looking at import options for the future.
How do I get paid?
Payments are processed through Stripe and paid directly into your bank account. There’s no marketplace wallet to withdraw from — money lands in your account on Stripe’s standard schedule.
Where can I learn more about growing my craft business?
Our blog has the Marketing Magic For Makers series, with practical advice on online and offline marketing, free tools, and seasonal sales tactics. It’s free to read whether you’re a vendor or not.