Etsy Seller Interview with Cristina of sombrasblancasdesign

How sombrasblancasdesign got started

Introduce your Etsy shop and tell us your story. How did you begin and decide on what to sell on Etsy, and how do you create your products?

I’m Cristina, a 33-year-old graphic designer and illustrator, and I’m the owner and creative behind Sombras Blancas Design on Etsy. I offer custom branding services such as logo and website design as well as premade logos and website templates. These are the services available in my shop, but I’m happy to work on any graphic projects my clients come to me with, from custom illustrations for a baby shower to an ebook cover or a restaurant menu template.

I joined Etsy back in 2012 after I took graphic design at college and fell in love with logo design. I started selling premade and custom logos while I was still studying and went full-time after a couple of years. Since then, I have been working from home, side by side with hundreds of small business owners worldwide, developing meaningful brands by turning their ideas into carefully crafted designs. As a small business owner myself, I know how hard it is to wear so many hats. That is why I pay special attention to making the process as smooth as possible, so they can focus on what they do best.

During these past 11 years, I have continued learning and adding services to my shop, such as WordPress website design and e-commerce solutions. Lately, I have been exploring Notion and Canva templates. When you are in the graphic and web design field, you need to keep an eye on the latest tools and trends in order to become familiar with them and find what works best.

Favorite items

What are your favorite items? What makes these so special? Why do you think these items might be selling well?

First of all, I absolutely love working on my custom logo and brand design packages, such as my Brand Identity Package. They allow me to work one-on-one with my clients, often when they are in the process of starting their own businesses, and that’s always a very rewarding experience.

For the past couple of years, I have also been enjoying creating Wix website templates. They are great for small business owners who want to have a professional-looking website but are on a tight budget and don’t want to spend many hours learning how to manage a complex system. I currently have 21 designs in different styles as well as a customization service for those who prefer to get a bit more help. When creating a new template, I have total freedom, and I like imagining how I would like my website to look if my job were a completely different one. My most popular template so far is Grace, which is designed with psychologists and therapists in mind, although it can be used for any service-based business.

Getting sales on Etsy

How long did it take for you to earn your first sale and how do you currently attract customers to your Etsy shop?

I honestly can’t remember how long it took me to make my first sale, but I know it wasn’t long. I invested a lot of time at the beginning, stocking my shop with a lot of unique premade logo designs. They were much more popular back then, so they started selling pretty well very soon. They also worked as a portfolio gallery for people looking for custom designs. They were able to see many examples of my work directly in my shop, and I think that attracted a lot of clients (and still does).

Nowadays, I mainly rely on word of mouth from previous clients and Etsy searches to bring new people to my shop. Whenever the shop is in a slower period, instead of using that time to promote my services, I take advantage of it to develop new products or learn new skills. I think offering a wider range of services is always a great way to stay up-to-date and attract new potential clients.

Managing sombrasblancasdesign

How do you manage your shop? Are you running solo or do you have any team members? What tools or services do you use to run your shop and how do you handle fulfillment?

It is just me in my little home office, with my computer, my graphics tablet, a cup of tea, and a ton of pencil sketches always lying around. I have someone who does my accounting, but other than that, I take care of both the design and customer service sides of the business. In this era of AI-generated images, especially, I feel my clients keep coming back to me because they value how communication flows and how we work together during the entire design process.

I use many different digital tools every day, but my favorites are:

Corel Draw: This is my main design software. I know it is unusual because most graphic designers work with Adobe Illustrator, but I started working with Corel back in college, and after who knows how many hours of use, I feel it is the most irreplaceable software in my toolbox.

WordPress: I work on self-hosted WordPress for my clients’ sites as well as my own website, where I host a blog, a resource gallery for small business owners, and my portfolio.

Notion: This is my digital planner, where I keep track of all my projects, daily tasks, finances, potential clients, ideas I come up with, and, in fact, my whole life. I love this app so much that I can’t imagine my daily work without it.

Dropbox: I use it to back up all my work as well as to send bulky final files to my clients. I have it synced both on my desktop computer and my laptop, so when I’m traveling, I can still access the latest version of all my files, no matter what device I last edited them on.

The future of sombrasblancasdesign 

What goals do you have for your shop in the future?

My main goal is to continue meeting new clients who allow me to work with them doing what I love most: applying my creativity to exciting, beautiful projects. Additionally, I would like to continue creating website templates as well as other ready-made products to add to my passive income stream.

Advice for new sellers

What’s your advice for a new seller starting an Etsy shop?

I always give the same piece of advice to people who want to start their own business and to creatives who want to start showcasing their work: start before you are ready. You are never going to feel like you know enough or have every single aspect under control. As soon as you start putting yourself out there, you will start learning loads of valuable information you wouldn’t be able to learn any other way. Experience is the best teacher for most things in life and selling online is no exception.