cafepress.com review

CafePress USED to be a great company.  Their production department is still pretty good, but the powers that be, the decision makers, are unethical, uncaring, unsympathetic and greedy.  CafePress really treats the artists that contribute their designs to the site horribly! 

Several years ago, my health came to the point that I could no longer print my own products, travel and do fairs, nor run a store any more.  I'm a single parent, so I had to find an alternative way to produce my designs on products as well as ship them before we lost our home.  I ran across CafePress.  I saw that they were a perfect fit to what I was looking for, so I dug deeper.  CafePress charges you for a storefront online, and we, the artists would upload our images, place them on products, decide the mark-up, etc.

So, I open a store. Then 2 more.  I even tried to be a consultant with my 3 decades of experience.

These WERE the terms. 

• We got to mark up the prices to whatever was appropriate for our designs.

• We were included in the search and marketplace on the site.

• We received tiered bonuses depending on how many products we sold.

• We received referral bonuses for referring new store owners (and customers I think)

• The relationship was mutually beneficial and respectful.

Then, the COLD winds of change began to blow about 12 - 18 months ago.  I went from feeling like a friend to feeling like a pimped-out whore.  Just in a little over a year:

• They took away all volume bonuses, so those artists that sell well get as much as a novice that just threw a couple of words on a product in block lettering and sold one.

• They took away all of our referral bonuses, so all of the people that I recommended and opened shops was free advertising for CafePress.

• They took away the right to price our own products in the marketplace.  They 'claim' that they would 'experiment' by changing percentages which was never done.  They stripped it to a minimum and that was that.

• They 'claim' that we can set prices in our own shops, but I have yet to see that translate into royalties.  I also find it ironic that orders that I know for a fact were generated through my sites (I even know a couple personally) were all dubbed 'marketplace' sales at the minimum markup.

• They have blocked me from talking to other shopkeepers so I don't blow their pricing secrets and to talk about what's bothering us.

• My income has dropped over 60% and my li'l girl & I are now in financial hell.  It has really affected what I can do for her.

• Now, without my permission/authorization, CafePress is now pimping out MY designs to other websites, including Amazon, at the same minimum rate! 

They think that they can do whatever the hell they want with what they do not own!  They treat the designers like crap, rip off the customers by overcharging, and from experience, I feel sorry for anyone who has a problem with their order.  I'm a shop owner and went through hell trying to get some items replaced that were misprinted.  Also, their BASE PRICE is what I've always sold as RETAIL prices in my stores and at fair stands. I've been in the business over 32 years, owned 3 stores, ran a few print shops and I know what things cost!  They are ripping off the shopkeepers AND customers BIG TIME! 

I hate to think about deleting the last store.  It took me two years to build with hundreds of designs and I have hundreds waiting in the wings.  But I stopped posting new designs once the bullcrap started. 

So, on behalf of all of the other designers that CafePress has mistreated, please boycott CafePress!!!