Hi, I'm new to this community and its sad that it appears to be a little quiet to say the least. Still, maybe if I post some stuff it might get some people interested again.

So I only very recently started leathercrafting. It has been a desire of mine for a little while but I really got the bug a couple of months ago and waited to go on a cheap course to see if I liked it before I started spending money on tools and supplies. And since I did it last Friday (7th of March) I've been having a lot of fun.

So here are the things I've made so far, I'm very much still learning and I know a lot of this is very rough still but I'm definitely improving already!

Card holder 1

Made in the workshop I did last Friday, I don't mind how this came out, but my stitching is really rough (I didn't really have a consistent method yet and kept putting the thread over or under in random orders.

Card holder 2

A few days after the workshop I used the tools and offcuts I bought at the workshop to make another of the same thing. I did forget to buy thread so used a strong upholstery thread I had lying around, which is why it looks very thin. Definitely did a better job cutting stuff out and lining it up this time.

A different type of card holder

This was a pattern I downloaded and printed onto paper. I really messed things up here, I wasn't accurate in cutting it out, the leather was horrible to work with, I messed up gluing it and just generally a bit of a disaster all round. But I did learn a lot from my mistakes.

A passport holder/cover

This I kind of self drafted. Its rather similar to the card holder but the measurements were taken from my old passport holder and then drafted using LibreCAD, printed out and glued onto some card so it would be more accurate to mark. I really took a lot more time with this one and I'm genuinely really happy with the results. My thicker flat waxed thread arrived and I was much more cautious in cutting things out, lining things up and trimming neatly. It is a tad snug but it will stretch a little with time and I plan to actually use this.

What next?

Next step I want to get some hardware fastenings so I can start doing fasteners etc. but I'm having a lot of fun just making things. I do hope my family and friends like leather goods...

So this is kind of a bit meta I guess. I want to start selling (not just yet but in the near future) low volume crafted goods (obviously made in Europe). Initially very low volume stuff made in my spare time and testing the waters to see if it is a viable business.

I'm not a programmer and the additional overhead of making my own website, hosting it myself or having to deal with stuff like payment gateways and order placement doesn't appeal to me so I've been looking at dedicated e-commerce platforms or website hosts with e-commerce plugins/features such as Shopify, Big Cartel, Wix, Squarespace etc.

Big Cartel was my current leader but it appears they are based in the US. Shopify I think is Canadian but I've been put off by their recent actions, Squarespace is US and Wix is Israeli.

I know there is Flohmarkt and I do intend to get involved there if I can but I think things are a bit rough and unknown with it still and I don't want to put anyone off ordering things or making life hard for myself unnecessarily. I also much prefer the idea of having more of a personalised website-style store rather than just listings or classifieds such as with Etsy or Flohmarkt.

So are there any good European owned alternatives that people are aware of that have features that are comparable to the above?