Online retailer Etsy taps weaving, knitting skills to create export market | The Australian
ONLINE retailer Etsy is tapping Australia’s basket-weaving and jumper-knitting skills to create a major export market, with a forum for arty and crafty types to sell their handiwork to the world.
The company, which bills itself as “the world’s handmade marketplace”, focuses on home-made and vintage furniture, clothing and decorative items, with mass-produced merchandise strictly prohibited.
Chief executive Chad Dickerson said Australia was now the fourth-largest source of buyers and sellers for the company, which launched in the US in 2005 and made $US525 million in sales worldwide last year.
The site charges a flat US20c for listing an item for sale, and an additional 3.5 per cent commission on the sale price — well below online market leader eBay, which in Australia charges up to $3 per listing and 7.9 per cent sales commission.
Mr Dickerson, visiting Sydney for the Vivid Festival of creative arts, said the company had set up a physical showroom in Melbourne to highlight the quality of artists selling through the site, although the items on display were not for sale.
“It’s really to give people a sense of what is sold on Etsy,” he said. “We’re promoting it the same way as we do most of our marketing — through social media like our Facebook page and Twitter accounts, which both really help with word of mouth.”
Mr Dickerson is also conducting seminars for local designers on how to make the most of the site. “While we’re a business, we’re trying to do things to really help the selling community, not just our own bottom line,” he said.
“In the past we haven’t really invested in Australia, but now we’re putting our own people on the ground and investing in a big way to help train sellers to be successful.”
This month, the privately held company raised $US40m from a syndicate of venture capitalist funds in order to fund expansion projects, including a push into new markets outside the US.
Launched in 2005, the company boasts 875,000 sellers and 15 million users around the world.
via Online retailer Etsy taps weaving, knitting skills to create export market | The Australian.
Strange Random Craft Quote:
No man who is occupied in doing a very difficult thing, and doing it very well, ever loses his self-respect. – George Bernard Shaw
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Insight: Pioneer Ireland fears austerity was in vain | Reuters
Reuters – Returning from an annual European trade show last month on a flight packed with successful Irish retailers, Ian Martin felt his country’s battered economy might finally be turning around.
A supplier of first aid and hygiene products to Irish companies, Martin has spent the last four years trimming costs, laying off some staff and cutting the hours of other employees.
Ireland’s government has been doing the same, making inroads into an enormous budget deficit and recapitalizing a near-collapsed banking system. The policies have been painful – the Irish consume 12 percent less than they did in 2007 – but Dublin has won praise around Europe for acting hard and fast.
Unfortunately, it may not matter. The political crisis in Greece and banking woes in Spain now threaten to end the modest Irish recovery spotted by Martin on last month’s flight.
“I think if there is a major crisis, people will literally stop spending money. That little bit of confidence that was coming back will be gone,” said Martin, who employs 20 people in three cities.
“It is the last thing we need, we have done as we’re told and we’re still not really coming out of it. It would really just be a further nail in the coffin.”
Martin is not the only one in Ireland watching developments in Greece and Spain with horror.
Ireland’s government oversaw a return to mild economic growth last year but it is quickly learning that its own policies alone will not fix Ireland’s debt pile, which will peak at 120 percent of GDP next year.
The country desperately needs two things: a stronger global economy so its exporters can begin selling more stuff, and a normalization of sovereign debt markets so Dublin can begin borrowing again and exit its international bailout on schedule next year.
Neither appear likely.
via Insight: Pioneer Ireland fears austerity was in vain | Reuters
Strange Random Ireland Quote:
“In Ireland the inevitable never happens and the unexpected constantly occurs.” – Sir John Pentland Mahaffy
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Like this:
Fox, NBC, CBS Sue Dish Network Over Service Skipping Ads – Bloomberg
News Corp. (NWSA)’s Fox Broadcasting Co., Comcast Corp. (CMCSA)’s NBCUniversal and CBS Corp. (CBS) sued Dish Network Corp. (DISH), alleging that their copyrights are infringed by Dish’s PrimeTime Anytime video-on-demand service that allows viewers to watch network programs commercial-free.
Dish created a “bootleg video-on-demand service,” which if not stopped “will ultimately destroy the advertising- supported ecosystem that provides consumers with the choice to enjoy free over-the-air, varied, high-quality primetime broadcast programming,” Fox said yesterday in a complaint in federal court in Los Angeles.
CBS and NBC sued Dish separately in the same court. The networks accused Dish of copyright infringement and asked for unspecified damages as well as court orders preventing its unauthorized distribution of their programs. Fox also sued Dish for breach of contract.
Dish, based in Englewood, Colorado, filed a separate complaint yesterday in federal court in New York against Fox, CBS, NBC and Walt Disney Co. (DIS)’s ABC. Dish seeks a court ruling that it isn’t infringing copyrights.
“Consumers should be able to fairly choose for themselves what they do and do not want to watch,” David Shull, Dish senior vice president of programming, said in a statement. “Viewers have been skipping commercials since the advent of the remote control; we are giving them a feature they want and that gives them more control.”
CBS, NBC Lawsuits
In March, Dish introduced its Hopper set-top box, which contains, in addition to a subscriber-controlled digital video recorder, a Dish-controlled section of the hard drive that records the entire primetime broadcast schedule of the four major networks every night, according to the Fox complaint.
Dish operates the PrimeTime Anytime service so that the copied shows can be watched commercial-free with its Auto Hop feature, Fox said.
via Fox, NBC, CBS Sue Dish Network Over Service Skipping Ads – Bloomberg.
Strange Random Television Quote:
Television is a new medium. It’s called a medium because nothing is well-done. – Fred Allen
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Vatican bank sacks president | BUSINESS News
The president of the Vatican bank has been ousted by the board of directors, the Vatican said today, blaming him for a deterioration in standards of governance.
The board unanimously passed a no-confidence vote in Italian Ettore Gotti Tedeschi for failing to carry out “various fundamentally important functions of his office”, the Vatican statement said.
The bank will seek a new president who can “re-establish full and effective relations between the Institute and the financial community, based on mutual respect of internationally accepted banking standards”, it said.
The Vatican bank, founded in 1942 by Pope Pius XII, has been in the spotlight since September 2010 when Italian investigators froze $38 million of its funds in Italian banks after opening an investigation into possible money-laundering.
Gotti Tedeschi told Reuters that he had been ousted because the bank did not like his honest way of doing things.
“I don’t want to speak or give interviews, I have paid for my transparency,” he said.
The Vatican recently adopted new financial transparency laws and set up internal regulations to make sure its bank and all other departments adhere to international regulations and standards, and cooperate with foreign authorities.
But in January, Italian newspapers published leaked internal letters that appeared to show a conflict among top Vatican officials about just how transparent the bank should be about dealings that took place before it enacted its new laws.
via Vatican bank sacks president | BUSINESS News | TV NZ.
Strange Random Vatican Quote:
“The Vatican is against surrogate mothers. Good thing they didn’t have that rule when Jesus was born.” – Elayne Boosler (American Comedian and Activist. b.1952)
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Asia’s richest man cleverly sidesteps possibility of family feud | Reuters
Reuters – Octogenarian Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing mapped out a succession plan for one of Asia‘s biggest family empires, ensuring a smoother transition for the Cheung Kong 0013.HK group than that of real estate rival Sun Hung Kai Properties (0016.HK).
Li told investors that while he had no plans to retire, elder son Victor would eventually take over at Cheung Kong Holdings and Hutchison Whampoa (0001.HK), the real estate to telecoms empire founded by Asia’s richest man.
The 83-year-old, whose personal wealth of $25.5 billion ranked him ninth on the 2012 Forbes Billionaires List, also said he would bankroll younger son Richard’s acquisitions, helping him to expand a business centered on Hong Kong’s fixed line carrier PCCW Ltd (0008.HK).
“Victor will assume the stakes I hold in the listed firms, including the 40 percent stake in Cheung Kong and the 35 percent stake in Canada-listed Husky Energy (HSE.TO),” Li told reporters. “He will be responsible for Cheung Kong’s group business in the future.”
The current market value of Li’s 40 percent stake in Cheung Kong and his 35 percent stake in Canada-listed Husky Energy is around HK$140 billion ($18 billion).
Some of Asia’s largest listed companies are family run, and succession plans are tightly held secrets, often only revealed through wills at the death of their founders, leading to bitter internal feuds.
“It is a very good move as it is clear-cut who is having what, avoiding potential struggle for shareholding, and it is good for the long-term stability of the group,” said Conita Hung, head of equity research of Delta Asia Financial.
Sun Hung Kai Properties, Asia’s largest real estate developer, and India’s Reliance group of companies have both been embroiled in bitter family disputes over leadership.
via Asia’s richest man cleverly sidesteps possibility of family feud | Reuters.
Strange Random Family Business Quote:
“Ultimately, it’s a family business.” – Ivanka Trump
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