We recently connected with Patrick Gensel and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Patrick thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s talk about keeping costs under control when growing. How have you managed to keep costs from getting out of control?
As my business grew, and I was producing more products, I realized that many of my lasercut wood products where leaving behind waste material that could be repurposed. I spend some time thinking about these pieces, and found a way to develop new products that were cut from the waste material of my main product offerings. This allowed me to effectively create additional products with no additional material cost. This has been a very effective way for me to keep my material costs low while experimenting with new products.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
My name is Patrick Gensel and I am a maker of things. In addition to sharing my creative journey over on my Instagram account, I also run a successful Etsy business called Pine and Print. At Pine and Print, I used Laser cutting and 3d printing to create fun and useful items. Some of my products include catch all trays, Trays for working on knives and other small items, as well as personalized car key storage solutions with a touch of elegance.
My journey started in 2019 when I decided to buy a 3D printer. I quickly found myself fascinated and immersed in the world of digital fabrication. It consumed me. After a few months I decided to purchase a laser, and Pine and Print was born. They name came from my plan to sell a combination of wood creations and 3d Printed Items. During the Pandemic, I was furloughed from my job, and had plenty of time to dedicate to my new passion, That time coupled with a new boom in online shopping created a perfect storm for a quickly growing Etsy shop. As the year went on, my furlough turned into a permanent layoff, and I hit the ground running. Making was now my fulltime job, and I wasn’t looking back. With each passing quarter i saw more and more growth which emboldened my excitement.
Fast forward to fall of 2022 when i decided to focus my Instagram account solely on the topic of making things. Thanks to consistency, and a lot of good luck, I was able to grow my following quickly over the course of a few months, Now I split my time between building relationship with brands, and growing my Etsy shop.
How did you build your audience on social media?
in the Fall of 2022, I decided that i was no longer going to use my Instagram account as a catch all dumping ground for photos and videos from my phone. I had started developing relationships with fellow makers and started to feel like I belonged with that community of people. I began to create content around what I was working on in my shop, and I was hooked, I loved sharing my day to day stories and creating fun reels about my projects or a maker topic. I spent the rest of 2022 consistently creating content about making things, and was enjoying it while experiencing modest growth. In early 2023 I went to an event called Workbench Con where I got to learn from and network with some of the most knowledagble and influential people in the maker community. From that weekend on, I applied what I learned at that event to grow my account even further. With the help of a few lucky breaks from some viral content, I was able to grow my account to over 90,000 followers over the course of 2024.
My advice to anyone just getting started is absolutely focus on being consistent. Consistency has been the thing that kept me going even when growth was slow.
How’d you think through whether to sell directly on your own site or through a platform like Amazon, Etsy, Cratejoy, etc.
I currently sell exclusively on Etsy. The reason I chose this platform is because I wanted a turnkey solution to get started. Despite the fees and perceived saturation in a lot of Niches, I still believe Etsy is a great place to get started and can still generate a lot of income. One of the great things about a marketplace like Etsy is the ability to test market a new product with almost no marketing costs. Simply list you product, and let the platform do its thing. I know that’s and over simplification, but compared to selling on your own site, where you would need to invest potentially thousands of dollars to bring in traffic, just to find that there is no demand for your product, testing a new product on Etsy is very low risk.
That being said, marketplaces aren’t without there downfalls. With a market place like Etsy, since you are on their platform, you are at the mercy of their rules, as well as their fees, and the overall aesthetic of the site. On your own website, you are in control of everything. Including bringing in traffic.
Contact Info:
- Website: pineandprintltd.etsy.com
- Instagram: patrickgensel