I’ve opened the shop here on ValleyOakPaper.com. Currently there are three boxes for sale. This is a bit of a soft launch, because I’m still setting things up. But it’s important to get stuff out there well in advance of the holiday season.

If you purchase anything, I’d love to hear your feedback. Even more so if you’re trying to buy something and fail! Please email me with any and all feedback.

Payments

So far I’ve set up Stripe for payment. That means that any credit or debit card is going to work. Please let me know if you run into any problems. Stripe charge $0.30 + 2.9% on all successful transactions.

I was thinking of setting up PayPal as well, but they charge $0.49 + 3.45%. If customers ask for it, I may set it up but for now I’ll hold off.

Personally I love paying with PayPal because it’s so convenient. But I may be an outlier because I’ve worked at PayPal.

Shipping

For shipping you can select US Post Office First Class Package for domestic as well as overseas locations. I’m charging you what it costs me to ship the items.

Local pick-up here in the South Bay part of the San Francisco Bay Area works too. Unlike Etsy, Squarespace has an option for it. So I don’t need the hassle of refunding shipping charges. Score one for Squarespace!

I’m planning on adding more shipping options when I have more products. That’s going to be important in the run-up to the holidays.

Future merchandise

I have some more boxes and card holders in the pipeline. Those should hit the shop next week.

Squarespace makes it incredibly easy to sell print-on-demand products through Printful. There are some promotional items 👚🎒🖊️ I’m planning on getting for myself through them. It’s super easy to offer the same items to customers here on ValleyOakPaper.com. Make sure you’re signed up for the weekly newsletter, so you don’t miss the announcement when I go live with merch.

On the other hand, if I want to offer some more original shirts or other products, Printify may be a better option. They’re an aggregator for print-on-demand providers. They’re prices are better than Printful’s and if you select the right print shop, the quality is also better.

To do list

• Google SEO research and implementation

• Google Analytics implementation

• Strategies for driving traffic to the shop

• Squarespace sales tools: promo codes, gift cards, etc

I think this is going to keep me busy for a while. 😂