9th & Elm’s curated site of designers does the work for shoppers

Sites like Etsy have become increasingly successful in recent years. Hundreds of thousands of designers now have a platform to sell their work on such sites …

9th & Elm do the hard work for shoppers by bringing independent designers.

Sites like Etsy have become increasingly successful in recent years. Hundreds of thousands of designers now have a platform to sell their work on such sites. But as Etsy becomes more profitable, it also becomes more difficult for independent designers to reach niche buyers.

This is the problem Clay and Elly Bethune noticed more than a year ago when they started planning 9th & Elm, a curated flash-sale website featuring handmade and independent designers.

“If you type in ‘jewelry’ on Etsy, there’s over five million searches that come up,” Clay said. “It’s really hard to navigate all of those designers and those products. We feel like we’re a curated site, we bring the best of the handmade and independent designers to our registered users on a daily basis so they can expect it’s going to be geared more toward the fashionista on a daily basis, rather than having your fashion product next to say, a repurposed refrigerator, something of that nature.”

The Bethunes aren’t new to the world of fashion—eight years ago the couple opened Elly’s Couture, a popular Columbia-based boutique—but they are new to this kind of curated site, which launched in June.

The number of designers featured on the site distinguishes 9th & Elm from your average online shopping experience. The site currently features the work of more than 150 designers. Shoppers can view items by product type or designer. Registered users can store purchasing information and opt in to receive daily emails featuring two to three of the site’s designers.

All of the hard work of shopping is taken care of, Elly said. Her and the team handpick all featured designs.

“I just love hearing all their background stories, why they got into being a designer and I just love looking at all their products,” Elly said. “It’s really fun for me. I get to shop all day.”

Clay Bethune said the site generated excitement from the beginning. The site had 50 designers on board before the June launch. In the first 90 days of its launch, 9th & Elm had more than 25,000 resisted users from across the U.S. and around the world. By January, they expect to reach more than 100,000 registered users. 

Registered users aren’t the only ones noticing 9th & Elm. A network of 100 bloggers is teaming with the site from Oct. 15 to 31 to offer product reviews and $400 in gift certificates to 9th & Elm. 

Dwolla, the Des Moines-based PayPal alternative, also picked 9th & Elm along with 24 other e-commerce sites to partner with and launch their new credit initiative—which was announced today. The partnership will allow an instant credit line on the site to registered users who choose to pay using Dwolla and help merchants retain more profit with its lower fees.

The expansion will only continue, Clay said. The fashion world is expansive, and 9th & Elm believes it has a great opportunity to expand its brand and service.

“The testimonies we’ve had from our designers have been overwhelming on how many products they’ve sold,” Clay said. “We’re excited to keep working with them, but more importantly, we feel like we’re just scratching the surface.”

 

Credits: Photos courtesy of 9th & Elm.

This story is part of the AIM Archive

This story is part of the AIM Institute Archive on Silicon Prairie News. AIM gifted SPN to the Nebraska Journalism Trust in January 2023. Learn more about SPN’s origin »

Get the latest news and events from Nebraska’s entrepreneurship and innovation community delivered straight to your inbox every Wednesday.