GPSR stands for General Product Safety Regulations and it is being enforced from 13th December 2024. It’s made up of a number of smaller points, most notably: 

1. All online product listings need to include manufacturer details and safety information. 
2. All online marketplaces (Etsy, Folksy etc) need to enforce these new rules, including test reports, packaging and product labels. 
3. Any safety issues, concerns or failings need to be reported immediately. 
4. All products must go through safety testing and have a safety rating. 
5. All products must be clearly labelled with above information and contact details. 
6. A Responsible Person within the EU must be appointed to monitor all of the above. 

This volume of information is an absolute overload for a small business, especially because we have our own handmade items as well as other small businesses. This means we need to not only pay to test all of our own items, share our suppliers info, have new labels printed etc, but we also need to request this from every other business we buy from. The reality is that won’t happen.  It’s also a weird case of sharing our ‘secret sauce’ - we would have to publish every single supplier we use for all of our materials amongst other things. 

Lastly, the big one, is the EU Responsible Person. We are in the UK, so this means appointing someone else on our behalf. They are appointed per product type, and from what we’re seeing, the absolute minimum cost seems to be around £700 per type, per year.  You don’t need to browse our website for long to see how many product types we have, and how big this cost alone will be.  If we decided to attempt to comply, it would cost us thousands upon thousands of pounds that we can’t afford, or we would have to pass it on to you, the customer. This would VERY quickly price us out of business. 

What’s next?

We will cease to accept orders from the EU, including Northern Ireland, from 10th December 2024. This gives us a couple of days to pack and ship everything before the new regulations kick in. 

✨ The only way to continue ordering with us is if you have friends or family within the UK that you can ship to, who can then send your order to you as a gift. ✨

There is a huge amount of talk about this in the small business community right now, as these changes seemed to sneak in under the radar. It may be that in the future there is more clarity, some small business relief allowance, or other changes. If this is the case, and we are able to comply, we will immediately begin to do so and reinstate worldwide shipping. 

Can’t you just… not do it? 

There a huge fines and penalties for non-compliance that can be in the tens of thousands and include jail time. So no, we can’t just pretend we didn’t hear about it. 

Does it affect USA, Canada, Australia etc?

Nope, only the EU and Northern Ireland. See the full list below: 

Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Republic of Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Northern Ireland, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden. 

Final thoughts 

This is a huge blow to our business. Not only does it affect daily sales, but we are also having to cancel and refund memberships to our Secret Society for EU members. Complying is a huge cost, but not complying is also having a big financial impact, as well as an emotional one. 

Please know we did not take this decision lightly. We love you EU (fuck you brexit). I’m sorry it’s ending like this 💔