CorpDigest
Etsy, Inc.
Leadership History
5 leaders · Full leadership timeline
Last reviewed: 2025-07-15 · By Swet Parvadiya
Etsy is at an inflection point. After eight years of Josh Silverman's leadership that grew revenue from $441 million to $2.88 billion, the company is retrenching under new CEO Kruti Patel Goyal. FY2025 revenue grew just 2.7% to $2.88 billion, the slowest pace since the IPO, while net income collapsed 46.3% to $163 million. The core Etsy marketplace GMS declined 5.3% to $10.46 billion, habitual buyers fell to 5.9 million, and active buyers dropped to 86.5 million. Yet the company maintains a 24.2% take rate, $734.5 million in Adjusted EBITDA, and $1.6 billion in cash. The strategic bet is that selling Depop for $1.2 billion and focusing all resources on the core marketplace will re-accelerate GMS growth in 2026. Q1 2026 guidance calls for Etsy marketplace GMS of $2.38-2.43 billion, slight year-over-year growth, and an Adjusted EBITDA margin of 28-30%. The question is whether Etsy can reverse buyer erosion in a market where Temu and Shein are spending billions to capture price-sensitive consumers, and whether the handmade value proposition remains compelling when household budgets are strained.
Founder & CEO
Kalin conceived Etsy as a marketplace for artisans after struggling to sell his handmade wooden computers. He established the company's mission to 'Keep Commerce Human' and built the initial community through craft fairs and word-of-mouth. He served as CEO during the founding period and a second stint from 2009-2011 before being fired. His tenure was marked by visionary creativity but erratic management that led to the departure of both technical co-founders.
CTO & CEO
Dickerson joined as CTO from Yahoo in 2008 to rebuild Etsy's technical infrastructure after the founder departures. He became CEO in 2011 and led the company to its April 2015 IPO at $16 per share, which surged 88% on the first day. He professionalized the company but was ousted in May 2017 after a first-quarter loss and activist investor pressure. Revenue grew from $193 million in 2012 to $441 million in 2016 under his leadership.
CEO
Silverman, former CEO of Skype and president at American Express, took over in May 2017 when the stock was $14. He cut $30 million in costs, refocused on core marketplace growth, and grew revenue from $441 million in 2017 to $2.88 billion in 2025. He navigated the COVID-19 boom ($10.3 billion GMS in 2020) and subsequent normalization, led the acquisitions of Depop and Elo7, and managed their eventual divestiture. He stepped down on December 31, 2025, becoming Executive Chair.
CEO
Goyal became CEO on January 1, 2026, after serving as President and Chief Growth Officer. She previously led Depop as CEO from September 2022, doubling its GMS and buyer base. She oversees Product, Engineering, Marketing, Customer Support, Trust and Safety, and Strategy and Operations. Her mandate is to re-accelerate GMS growth in the core Etsy marketplace using AI-powered personalization and agentic commerce partnerships.
Chief Financial Officer
Baker joined as CFO in 2024 and has emphasized Etsy's financial discipline. In Q4 2025, he noted that the core Etsy marketplace hit its highest Adjusted EBITDA margin level of the year at approximately 30%. He has guided the company's capital allocation toward share repurchases ($777 million in FY2025) and core marketplace investment while managing the divestiture of Reverb and Depop.
The most immediate threat to Etsy's margin and market share is the collapse in habitual buyer engagement combined with intense competition from ultra-low-cost Chinese retailers. In Q4 2025, habitual buyers — defined as those spending $200+ on 6+ days over the trailing twelve months — fell to 5.9 million, down from 6.4 million in Q4 2024, a 7.8% decline. These high-value customers drive a disproportionate share of revenue and profitability; their erosion directly threatens Etsy's ability to maintain its 24.2% take rate. Simultaneously, Temu and Shein have flooded the U.S. market with mass-produced goods at prices Etsy sellers cannot match. In December 2023, Wedbush analysts specifically cited these competitors as crowding out spending on non-essential durables and driving advertising costs to unsustainable levels. Etsy responded by laying off 225 employees (11% of its workforce) in December 2023, cutting its headcount from approximately 2,420 to 2,195, and pausing hiring. The competitive pressure is structural: Temu spent an estimated $1.7 billion on U.S. marketing in 2023, while Shein's annual revenue exceeds $30 billion. Both platforms target price-sensitive consumers with factory-direct goods, undercutting Etsy's value proposition of unique, handmade items. Etsy faces a second challenge in seller retention and quality. Active sellers on the Etsy marketplace declined to 5.6 million in Q4 2025 from 5.7 million in Q4 2024, and the company introduced a seller setup fee in early 2024 to combat low-quality listings, which initially caused a seller purge. However, seller retention inflected positively in Q4 2025, with sequential growth for the first time since the fee introduction. A third challenge is international weakness: while 26% of GMS comes from international buyers, non-U.S. GMS had declined for multiple quarters before stabilizing in Q1 2026. Currency fluctuations, regulatory changes (including retroactive digital services taxes in Canada that cost Etsy $6.1 million in 2024), and shipping complexity create headwinds. A fourth challenge is the Depop divestiture: Etsy acquired Depop for $1.625 billion in 2021, wrote down $897.9 million of that value in 2022, and is now selling it to eBay for $1.2 billion — a $425 million loss on the acquisition price, not accounting for the $1 billion total impairment. This signals a failed diversification strategy and raises questions about Etsy's capital allocation discipline. The fifth challenge is debt and leverage: Etsy carries $2.98 billion in total debt ($649 million short-term, $2.33 billion long-term) against a stockholders' deficit of $1.1 billion, making it technically insolvent on a book-value basis. The company issued $700 million in convertible senior notes in 2025 to strengthen its position, but interest obligations and potential dilution from conversion create financial pressure.