Selling THIS Will Get You Suspended on Etsy (Fix This ONE Mistake)

About this video

The creator warns that products built on other brands’ copyright and trademark — she shows Etsy search results full of Taylor Swift, Harry Potter and Disney products, including bestsellers — can destroy a shop, and that other sellers getting away with it only means enforcement hasn’t reached them yet. To check risk, she demonstrates searching the USPTO trademark database (showing Starbucks’ protected marks and checking phrases like ‘in my era’, where some variants were abandoned and others trademarked), and gives a self-test: if you are financially benefiting from associating with a brand or artist’s name, image or brand names like Gucci or Tiffany in a listing (other than a true vintage item), it is probably infringement. She notes gray areas such as a Starbucks logo peeking out in a mockup, and stresses it is the IP owner, not Etsy, who decides to report — owners must file one by one, often hire virtual assistants to do it, and takedowns come in waves; a brand that never cared before may start tomorrow. On strikes, she says there is no hard rule: she has seen sellers survive five to seven strikes and others removed after two. She advises monitoring inactive listings for ones marked ‘deactivated by Etsy’ in case a notice email is missed or goes to spam. Etsy, she says, trusts the reporter rather than legally evaluating a claim. Recounting her own cases — a listing deactivated over her use of ‘Tiffany blue’ in her first year, and a separate false report against a ‘girl mom’ design where the reporter’s trademark was for the phrase written differently — she says Etsy chat told her appeals on copyright/trademark are not entertained and the only route was her attorney. Her guidance: don’t spend attorney time on a weak listing, but if a falsely reported listing is a bestseller, contact the trademark owner directly using the contact info in the report, since legal costs apply to them too.

Key takeaways

• Don’t build listings on Taylor Swift, Disney, Harry Potter or any other brand’s IP just because bestsellers do — enforcement is a matter of time
• Check the USPTO trademark search before using names, phrases or logos, and apply the test: if you profit from association with someone else’s brand, it’s likely infringement
• Only the IP owner (or their representative, often VAs) can report you — not Etsy — and brands file in waves and can start enforcing at any time
• There is no fixed strike count: the creator has seen shops survive 5-7 strikes and others removed after 2; monitor inactive listings for ‘deactivated by Etsy’ notices
• Etsy trusts the reporter and doesn’t entertain trademark/copyright appeals — for a false report on a valuable listing, contact the trademark owner directly rather than expecting Etsy to reverse it

Episode details: published May 27, 2024 · 7:59 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. Business results and any income figures mentioned are Dylan Jahraus’s own claims, shared for education — they are not typical or guaranteed.

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