Etsy Print on Demand Income Report: December 2024 ($28K+)

ByJ.B. Updated on
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December 2024 Etsy Print on Demand Income Report

December. Was. Crazy.

Between last-minute holiday shoppers requesting express shipping, custom order requests (why do they always come in at the eleventh hour?), and the glorious Cha-Ching sounds rolling in, December felt like a sprint to the finish line.

But you know what? The hustle was worth it.

December 2024 turned out to be my best month of the year and my best month…ever in my shop. I started in October 2022, and have totaled $168.8K in sales as of January 2025.

In 2024, I ended the year with $135K in sales.

I’m proud of the year over year growth and that I kept going when sales were down and I thought that I should give up. Everyone reading this with slow sales, keep going, keep learning, and keep improving and it will pay off.

Let’s dive into the numbers that made this month a standout.

Breaking Down the Numbers

Total Revenue: $28,657.17

My first full year, I made ~$29,000 in sales, and in December 2024, I almost made that same amount in a month!

Revenue was up by over $7,000 compared to November 2024, which makes sense given the holiday rush. People were ready to gift thoughtful, creative items—and that’s where Etsy Print-on-Demand shines.

Create unique, giftable products that people are searching for and shoppers will flood you with orders.

Evergreen Strategy Works

I only have 3 holiday items in my store. The rest are evergreen products. I felt that Q4 is seasonal because of the holidays, but also because EVERYONE is searching and buying gifts. So I offered unique items that shoppers bought all year round.

Those people will come back to my shop for birthdays, anniversaries, and the following holiday season!

The Opportunity Report displayed on multiple devices showing weekly reports, product listings, and business analytics content.

Free for Freedom Unclocked Members

The Opportunity Report

Struggling with finding trends? Get done-for-you Etsy keyword research from a multi six figure seller, delivered weekly.

The Opportunity Report gives you a validated keyword that is selling on Etsy every single week.

Get access for only $9/mo.

Challenges Faced

The Custom Order Chaos
Holiday shoppers love custom orders—but the rush can be intense. I had several requests that came in way too close to shipping deadlines. The crazy part is, I don’t even offer customized or personalized orders in my shop.

Shoppers would just message me asking for a specific customization. When I could, I would take them on. While I was able to fulfill most, a few had to be declined.

Setting clearer cutoff dates for custom orders will save everyone stress.

I was up front with every shopper that the cutoff for Christmas delivery was December 11. Most understood, but I did get a few angry customers that were glued to their tracking information and sent me angry messages. Mostly men!

There was also a postal strike in Canada which caused several items to be delayed. Luckily, not one Canadian customer complained.

Goals for 2025

After the December madness, I’m focusing on three key areas for January:

Niche Refinement

Dive deeper into my own niches to keep the shop thriving post-holidays. Create more items that sold well during December.

Scale my Shopify Store

I treasure diversification. I never want to be without my Etsy shop. I love it so much. But, sometimes Etsy’s bots have other ideas.

While my POD shop has not been shut down ever (knock on wood), my digital Etsy shop was put on vacation mode by Etsy for no reason.

Etsy did not email me, and I could not get an answer as to why it was shut down. It came back 72 hours later, but that was a stressful time! I’ve decided to revamp my Shopify store and hired an amazing company to help me.

I want to build it and lean into Facebook ads to bring more traffic to the store because Google SEO ain’t cutting it.

Once I get that up and running, I plan to document more of that process here on the blog.

Email Marketing

Set up a welcome sequence for new customers and begin to nurture existing customers. I have maybe 50 subscribers, but it is worth it to start to build a community around my little shop!

Update: I now have 146 subscribers to my email list!

What Makes All the Difference?

If there’s one thing that changed my trajectory faster than anything else, it was learning to find what people were already searching for before I designed anything.

I package up exactly what I research every month inside The Opportunity Report, the niches, the demand signals, the products worth creating right now. It’s $9/month and you can grab it here.

The Opportunity Report displayed on multiple devices showing weekly reports, product listings, and business analytics content.

Free for Freedom Unclocked Members

The Opportunity Report

Struggling with finding trends? Get done-for-you Etsy keyword research from a multi six figure seller, delivered weekly.

The Opportunity Report gives you a validated keyword that is selling on Etsy every single week.

Get access for only $9/mo.

If you’re reading this thinking “I want to build something like this but I don’t know where to start,” that’s exactly why I built Freedom Unlocked. It’s the Etsy POD membership I wish existed when I was starting. It has my full Etsy strategy course, with my D.R.E.A.M. method framework, bi-weekly group coaching, the Opportunity Report, Custom GPT Prompt Generator, Tutorial Library, and more! Join the community today!

laptop mockup with etsy course freedom unclocked

Freedom Unclocked

Ready to build an Etsy POD shop with a strategy that actually works?

The Freedom Unclocked Membership is a complete Etsy POD course, the exact method I used to grow my shop to multi-six figures, plus live group coaching and a community doing the work alongside you.

join today!

Final Thoughts

December was a whirlwind, but it’s proof that with strategy, preparation, and a lot of resilience, you can crush your Etsy goals—even in the busiest season of the year.

To all my fellow dreamers, keep pushing, keep learning, and don’t let the chaos of a big month scare you. I mean, how could it?

Slow sales or busy months, it’s all part of the journey. If you’re feeling overwhelmed or stuck, remember: I started small, too. Your next big win could be just around the corner.

Here’s to making this year the one where you truly dream big and make it happen.

The Best SEO and Design Tools for Your Print on Demand Shop:

These are the only tools I use for my shop!

Canva: Canva is the most amazing tool. It is user friendly, and always improving! The tools that Canva has have evolved so much since I first started using it in 2022 for the better. I use it almost everyday. I use it to create designs, to edit AI designs, and to create product mockups.

Ideogram: Ideogram is an AI design tool that generates high-quality graphics with exceptionally accurate text rendering, making it ideal for creating quote-based and typography-focused designs. I also use the prompt based editing for mockups, making it a wonderful alternative to Photoshop, which is expensive.

E-Hunt: E-Hunt is fantastic for competitor research and some light keyword research. My favorite aspect of E-Hunt is the Chrome extension that allows you to see the sales amount for an individual item on Etsy. Check out this article to see an example.

eRank: eRank is an SEO data tool that also allows you to search the competition and will also give you key words for your Etsy listing. It is also a low cost tool that will help you find low competition and highly searched niches.

Printify: Printify is a print-on-demand (POD) service that allows individuals and businesses to create and sell custom-designed products without needing to manage inventory or handle fulfillment. I put my designs on products offered by Printify. When an item sells, Printify prints and ships to my customer.

Vela: Vela is the bulk editing tool I use to manage hundreds of Etsy and Shopify listings without losing my mind. You can update videos, photos, titles, tags, descriptions, and prices across your entire shop in minutes, and your VA can build listings inside Vela without needing your Etsy login. Read more about Vela here.

Shopify: Shopify is what I recommend when you are ready to scale beyond Etsy and diversify where your products sell. The fees are lower, you own your customer data (emails), and it integrates directly with Printify and Vela. It is the easiest way to build a standalone storefront that you control. Read more about Etsy v Shopify here.

FAIRE: FAIRE is the wholesale marketplace I use to sell my products to retail, brick and mortar stores. If you want to scale your shop and add a wholesale revenue stream to your POD business, FAIRE is a great option. Read more about FAIRE here.

Looking for more information on print on demand? Check out these articles:

Janeen is a former attorney and Etsy print on demand coach who started her shop at 40, retired early from corporate life at 42, and moved her family to Portugal. She now teaches others the strategic path to building portable income, while exploring and documenting the most beautiful country she gets to call home.