How starting an Etsy shop led me to build my first website

I did a lot but it was fun!

I had this idea, what if I sold random items in an Etsy shop? First, I needed to figure out how I was going to get random items. After digging through dropshipping rabbit holes, I discovered that I could use websites like Printify, or Printful to quickly create sellable, shippable products. Okay, I got items but what are they gonna look like? To keep the “random” theme going just decided to randomize the designs. Okay, but how are you gonna do that? Well, I will pick 3 colors—at random—and a theme—you guessed it, at random—to go along with the..random item.

Once I realized that I, myself, wasn’t going to effectively randomize colors, a theme, and an item. I knew then I needed to build a website. Okay, but websites don’t automatically randomize items for you. How was I gonna get a website to do it? Well, with the help of Python, Flask framework, TheColorApi, and of course a little HTML and CSS. Whattosellinmyetsy.shop was born!

The first successful click of Generate was all the dopamine I needed but I did not stop there. The project's full potential was calling out to me.

“Put me on Tiktok, Leon. Turn me into a Tiktok, Leon. Tiktok is my home.”

“Send. Me. Home.”

I could not ignore the call. To Tiktok we went! Thus, our page was born.

So far I’ve sold no items but I’ve had a ton of fun along the way!