Etsy sent out a notice informing sellers that moving forward, Shippo and Shipstation will be the only third-party shipping services to be offered on the website. This means that other providers like Pirate Ship, Easyship, and ShippingEasy will no longer be offered as an integration. There's since been much confusion around what this notice actually means.
Etsy's notice to sellers stated:
“For sellers shipping from the US, as of October 21, 2024, Shippo and ShipStation are the only third-party shipping apps which, when integrated into your Etsy account, will automatically import and export all shipping-related data between your shop and the shipping partner. If you’re a US seller and you’ve integrated a third-party shipping service other than Shippo or ShipStation before October 21, 2024, these services will continue to function as usual, with shipping data being automatically imported and exported.”
Pirate Ship was caught off guard by the unexpected news and sent customers an e-mail:
“Etsy says that any connections that were made before Monday ‘will continue to function as usual,' but since existing connections sometimes require reauthorization, it’s unclear if you will be able to continue importing orders from Etsy in the future.”
“Please know that we’re actively attempting to contact Etsy to understand why they did this and try to restore the effortless service you deserve, but unfortunately Etsy has not responded to any of our outreach.”
Note that even if these other 3rd party providers wouldn't be able to integrate with Etsy, sellers could still use them. They'd just have to manually enter the customer and shipping info and then manually add the tracking number — a cumbersome process.
I'm a huge fan of Pirate Ship — incredible prices and support — and they're usually my top recommendation for small merchants. It's frustrating that Etsy would take away such a great solution so willy-nilly.
And that's not to say that Shippo and Shiptation aren't also great solutions with competitive rates. I've used both for client projects in the past and have no complaints with either. I'm just curious why Etsy would remove the choice from sellers.
A confusing update to the story:
E-commerce consultant Cindy Baldassi posted about the issue on LinkedIn, and GeekSeller co-founder Daniel Sodkiewicz chimed in on the comments.
Sodkiewicz pointed out that there are thousands of 3PL companies and inventory management platforms like GeekSeller that Etsy sellers currently connects to, and that he can't imagine they'd all lose access. He wrote:
“Is this some kind of incorrect language, and should it just be said that those two partners are preferred? I've read the announcement multiple times and still don't understand it. As app developers, we haven’t received any email from Etsy about it. The app developer portal shows our app is in good standing, and all the API documentation is still available to build apps that support order management. So, I’m not sure what’s supposed to happen on October 21st.”
Baldassi also shared an update from Pirate Ship which read:
“We're pretty confident these changes won't affect Pirate Ship's integration with Etsy, as our integration is not an Etsy app that is installed within an Etsy account. Instead, it's an integration installed in Pirate Ship directly that requires the purchase labels within our platform. As of now, we don't foresee any changes for those who currently use our Etsy integration or those who install the Etsy integration after this deadline.”
So in summary? No-one knows what's eventually going to happen. However as of this morning, Etsy sellers are reporting on the forum that their Pirate Ship integrations are still working. I'll update this story as more information is revealed.