A Wisconsin woman was dismayed to discover a pair of handmade items she purchased at a local craft fair might be worth significantly less than the $50 she paid for them.
Jennifer Williamson told Newsweek that she purchased the two crocheted items, a hand-knitted hanging strawberry plant along with some yellow flowers, from a small craft fair in Eau Claire because she thought they were “cute.”
“There were other vendors there that I could definitely tell were making their own crochet items because they had small imperfections and inconsistencies, but I wasn’t as drawn to their items,” she said.
Jennifer Williamson thought these crocheted strawberries had been handmade by the seller. But a Google search suggested otherwise.
@jennay4399/TikTok
Williamson had already left the fair by the time she decided to Google them “out of curiosity” more than anything else. It was a decision she would live to regret, with the search results revealing that both items appeared suspiciously similar to items listed for sale on the discount Chinese marketplace Temu.
Launched in September 2022, Temu has become a major player in the e-commerce world because of its extremely low pricing. According to Statista, in August 2024 alone, the Temu app was downloaded a staggering 54.42 million times.
But while those discounts might be beneficial to ordinary customers, it would appear that some are potentially exploiting the platform.
“I felt pretty bummed and even a bit stupid after realizing it’s highly likely that these items were bought from Temu,” Williamson said. “I spent $30 on the yellow flowers and $20 on the hanging strawberry plant. Each item goes for less than $10 on Temu.”
This might not be the first time sellers have seemingly attempted to pass off items from heavily discounted chain stores as handmade goods.
In 2023, Which?—a U.K. based organization focused on informed consumer choice in the purchase of goods and services found some sellers on the craft-led online marketplace Etsy—may have been falsely describing items as handmade and charging up to six times more than they cost from other retailers.
Though Etsy took steps to address the issues, Williamson’s experience suggests that it may continue to be a problem.
“I feel as though this has become a lot more common in the last three to five years,” she said.
The whole experience certainly left a sour taste in Williamson’s mouth.
“I felt pretty bummed and even a bit stupid after realizing it’s highly likely that these items were bought from Temu or Aliexpress,” she said.
“It’s also worth noting that the vendor has no online presence, no website, Facebook, or Instagram, so I’m even more led to believe the items weren’t made by the vendor. Every artist that makes their own items that I’ve seen has some sort of online presence, and it’s a necessity in order to gain business as an artist.”
She said she is definitely going to be a “lot more discerning” when it comes to shopping at craft fairs in the future, though she reckons she may have hit on one way to spot the genuine sellers.
“The next time I go to a fair, I’ll ask the vendors if they can make something custom for me,” she said. “Most, if not all, artists would love to be commissioned for a custom piece.”
In the meantime, she hopes that the video she posted to TikTok under the handle @jennay4399 not only informs but also sparks discussion on the issue. Williamson said she’s already seen some of that in the comments section accompanying the clip.
“There were a lot of artists commenting that they’ve seen this from other vendors at craft fairs while trying to sell their own art and how discouraging it can be,” she said. “What I hope people take away from my experience is that it’s important to use caution when purchasing, and always try to discern where items come from, whether at a craft fair or the grocery store.”
