arts&life

p ro f i l e

The

Golden

Touch

Ann Arbor-native — and Etsy CEO —

Josh Silverman has a knack for success.

ALICE BURDICK SCHWEIGER SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

T

ABOVE: Josh Silverman.
LEFT: Custom finger, hand
and footprint necklaces from
GracePersonalized.
BELOW: A custom pil-
low made by Etsy seller
Psychobaby.

30

June 28 • 2018

jn

his past May marked the
one-year anniversary of
Josh Silverman becoming
CEO of Etsy, the online market-
place that specializes in buying
and selling vintage goods and
handmade arts and crafts. Since
Silverman, an Ann Arbor native,
took over the helm, the com-
pany’s stock has risen and sales
have increased.
“Etsy is a special company,”
says Silverman, who now resides
in New York City. “We live in a
society where people are wearing
and buying the same mass-
produced products. Everything
has become automated and
industrialized, but Etsy is a ref-
uge in that sea of sameness. The
products are unique and the
buyer and seller connect in a real
human way.”
The premise of Etsy is simple.
Entrepreneurs
En
can sell their
wares
wa while paying low fees and
are
ar provided easy-access assis-
tance
as a seller with their own
ta
webpage
within the Etsy com-
we
munity.
It also allows sellers to
m
interact
personally with buyers
i in
— and allows buyers to be cer-
tain
ta of what they’re getting. And
it gives would-be entrepreneurs
the
th chance to test their products

before launching a full-fledged
business. What might begin as
an on-the-side hobby — print-
making, button collecting, per-
sonalized paper goods, jewelry
design and so much more — can
become an established business
and source of income on Etsy.
It wasn’t surprising that Etsy,
first established in 2005, chose
Silverman to be its new leader.
Silverman, 49, graduated Ann
Arbor’s Community High in
1987 and went on to earn an
undergraduate degree at Brown
University, and then an MBA at
Stanford. After graduation, he
co-founded Evite, which became
the leading online social-event
planning site.
“One of the investors in Evite
was an employee of eBay when
it was getting off the ground,”
Silverman says. “He told me that
eBay was exploding internation-
ally and he needed help to run it
overseas. So, I joined eBay with
the understanding that they
could send me anywhere in the
world — and I ended up in the
Netherlands. I launched eBay’s
European online classified busi-
ness.”
Silverman continued to run
a succession of businesses that