Can buyers see my production partner on Etsy?

Yes. Etsy shows production partner details in your shop’s About section and tells buyers the item was designed by you. If you’d rather not show the company’s name, turn off the name toggle and use a descriptive title such as “Apparel printer”.

Do I need a separate production partner for each Printify print provider?

Not for Printify’s integration. Its guide uses one partner named “Printify”, which it assigns automatically when it publishes. You can add each print provider separately for extra detail, but then you’ll have to select the right one on every listing yourself.

Does having a production partner hurt my Etsy search ranking?

Etsy’s search visibility guidance doesn’t list production partners as a factor. It focuses on photos, category, return policy, shipping price, your logo and customer service. What does hurt is having listings removed for breaking Etsy’s rules.

Can I add a production partner in the Etsy Seller app?

Not a new one. Add partners on Etsy.com under Settings → Partners you work with, and they’ll appear as options in the app when you create or edit a listing.

Do digital downloads need a production partner?

No. A production partner physically makes an item for you. Digital files you design yourself are listed as “designed by” you with no partner, though you still need to disclose AI use if a design was made with AI tools.

How to Add an Etsy Production Partner (Printify, Printful)

Add an Etsy production partner for Printify, Printful or Gelato: the exact steps and fields, what to write, how to bulk-assign listings and what if you skip it.

To add a production partner on Etsy, go to Shop Manager → Settings → Partners you work with and select Add a new production partner. Enter the company (for example Printify), its location and a short public description, answer a few private questions and save. Then link the partner to every print-on-demand listing, either in the listing editor or in bulk from your Listings page.

It takes about ten minutes once, and it keeps every Etsy production partner requirement covered. Below are the exact fields, what to write for Printify, Printful and Gelato, how to fix listings that went live without a partner, and the mistakes that cause trouble later.

Key takeaways

Etsy requires you to disclose a production partner on every listing that an outside company produces, which covers all print-on-demand.
Add partners on Etsy.com (not the Seller app), then assign them in the listing editor or in bulk with Editing options → Change production partners.
Name it exactly “Printify” and Printify assigns it automatically when it publishes; Printful and Gelato listings need it selected by hand.
You can hide the partner’s name from buyers and show a descriptive title such as “Apparel printer” instead.
Without a partner, Printify listings default to “Made by seller”, which misstates how they’re made and can get listings removed.

What is a production partner on Etsy?

Etsy defines a production partner as a company or person outside your shop who physically produces items from your own original designs, such as a printing service or an apparel maker. Its own examples of production partner types include print-on-demand services like Printful and Printify. Under Etsy’s Creativity Standards, your original designs produced by a partner count as “designed by a seller”, and you must disclose the partner and give accurate information about where the item ships from.

Etsy is just as clear about who isn’t a production partner: you or your shop members, materials suppliers, helpers who did one small step of an item you mostly made, white-label or original equipment manufacturers, and wholesalers selling finished goods. (Etsy’s list also includes pets.) Sourcing ready-made products from those businesses counts as reselling, which our POD vs dropshipping comparison explains.

Made by vs designed by vs sourced by

Etsy sorts every item into one of four categories. Here’s where POD fits:

Etsy category	What it covers	POD example	Production partner?
Made by a seller	Items you make by hand or with your own tools at home, such as a Cricut or laser cutter	Not POD	No
Designed by a seller	Your original designs produced by a partner, plus seller-prompted AI creations	Your design printed on a tee by Printify	Yes
Sourced by a seller	Craft and party supplies, and items personalized with the buyer’s own text or image and made by a partner	A tee printed on demand with the buyer’s name	Yes
Handpicked by a seller	Vintage items, items from nature and curated gift baskets	Not POD	No

Based on Etsy’s Creativity Standards, last updated June 2025.

Most POD listings are “designed by” you. Personalized POD items, where the buyer supplies the name or text, fall under “sourced by a seller”, and Etsy’s help center confirms they still need a production partner. Our personalized print-on-demand guide covers how those orders work.

How to add a production partner on Etsy, step by step

These are the steps from Etsy’s help article Working with Production Partners on Etsy, checked in September 2026:

Sign in on Etsy.com and open Shop Manager. You can’t add new partners in the Etsy Seller app, but partners you add on the website show up there afterwards.
Select Settings, then Partners you work with. Older guides call this page “Production partners”, so look for either name.
Select Add a new production partner.
Enter the partner’s name in the Production partner field. Turn on Show this production partner’s name to buyers if you want it public; if not, enter a Descriptive title such as “Apparel printer”.
In Location, start typing the partner’s city or region and pick it from the list.
In About production partner, describe how you work together. This text is public, so write it for buyers.
Answer the More about your partnership questions. Etsy uses these internally; buyers don’t see them.
Check the preview of how it will look in your shop’s About section, then select Save partner.

What to enter for Printify, Printful and Gelato

Each provider publishes its own suggestions for the form:

Field	Printify	Printful	Gelato
Production partner name	Printify, spelled exactly like that	Printful	Gelato
Location	Wilmington, DE, USA	A Printful fulfillment center	Oslo, Norway (its headquarters)
Descriptive title if you hide the name	A print shop	A print shop	Print on demand drop shipper
Partnership answers	The three answers below	The same three answers	Not specified; answer accurately
Added to listings automatically?	Yes, if a partner named “Printify” exists	No, select it on each listing	No, select it on each listing

Suggestions from each provider’s help center, September 2026. Enter details that are accurate for how you work.

For the private questions, Printify and Printful both suggest the same three answers: “I don’t have the technical ability to make it entirely by myself”, “I design everything myself” and “They do everything for me”. For the public description, plain and honest works best:

Should you name the actual print provider instead of “Printify”? You can, and it’s more specific, but Printify’s integration only assigns a partner named “Printify” automatically, so you’d have to select the right one on every listing yourself. Either way, make sure the ship-from location in your shipping profile matches where the items really come from; our shipping profile guide for POD shows how.

How to link the partner to your listings

In the listing editor

Open the listing and find the section about how it’s made (Etsy’s current help calls it “How it’s made”; provider guides also call it “About this listing” or “Core details”). Set Who made it? to Another company or person, select production partners, choose your partner and publish the changes. You can also create a new partner from here.

In bulk

In Shop Manager, open Listings, tick the listings you want to fix (or all of them), choose Editing options and then Change production partners, select the partner and choose Update. This is the fastest way to fix a shop that published dozens of listings before the partner existed.

Automatically through Printify

Printify can’t create a production partner in your Etsy account, but if one named “Printify” already exists, it assigns it to each listing as it publishes. If not, the listing defaults to “Made by seller”. Printful works differently: it doesn’t add the partner for you, but it saves new products to Etsy as drafts so you control when the $0.20 listing fee is charged, which is the perfect moment to select the partner before you activate the listing. If you haven’t linked your shop yet, our guide to connecting Printify to Etsy puts this step in order.

Hands sketching a leaf design on the left and a print shop lifting a t-shirt with the same leaf on the right — You design, your partner produces, and Etsy asks you to say so on every listing.

Production partner and AI disclosure: you need both

The production partner tells buyers who makes the item. It says nothing about how the design was created. If a design came from AI tools and your own prompts, Etsy separately requires you to disclose that in the listing description, even when the partner is set correctly.

A single “About this design” line near the top of each description covers both, for example: “I created this design from my own idea using AI tools. It’s printed on demand and shipped by my production partner.” Our guide to selling AI designs on Etsy has more wording options, and the Etsy description template shows where the line fits.

Disclosure wording on every listing, automatically

POD Made Easy writes your title, 13 tags and description, and adds Etsy’s AI-disclosure and production-partner wording to each one, so nothing slips when you publish in batches. You still set up the partner once on Etsy, as shown above.

Start your free trial

What happens if you don’t add a production partner?

Your listings say the wrong thing. Listings published through Printify without a “Printify” partner default to “Made by seller”, telling buyers you made something a print shop produced.
Listings can be removed. Etsy reserves the right to remove listings that don’t follow its Creativity Standards, and you still owe the fees for them. Repeated policy problems put the whole shop at risk.
Orders can be affected. Printful’s help center warns that Etsy may block or delay orders that aren’t clearly linked to a production partner.
Buyers feel misled. A buyer who expected a handmade item and receives a printed tee is more likely to leave a disappointed review.

One more signal to heed: Etsy says that if the listing editor asks you to add a production partner and you don’t have one, you should check the Seller Policy to make sure the item is allowed at all.

Common production partner mistakes

A name that doesn’t match. Printify’s integration looks for a partner named “Printify”, so variations like “Printify Inc” or “My Printify partner” can leave listings unassigned.
Fixing new listings only. Use the bulk tool to update everything that went live before the partner existed.
One partner for every provider. If you sell through Printify and Printful, add both and assign each to its own listings. Our Printify vs Printful vs Gelato comparison covers running providers side by side.
A ship-from location that doesn’t match the partner. Etsy asks you to update shipping locations to reflect where your partner ships from.
Listing yourself, your team or a materials supplier. None of them qualify.
Skipping the AI disclosure because the partner is set. They’re separate requirements.

These sit alongside the other setup slips in our list of print-on-demand mistakes.

Production partner checklist

A partner created on Etsy.com for each provider you use.
The Printify partner named exactly “Printify”.
An accurate location and a plain, public description.
Every POD listing linked, checked with the bulk editor.
Shipping profile origins that match where items ship from.
An AI disclosure line in the description wherever a design used AI.
An About section that explains how your items are made.

With those in place, the policy side of your shop is covered. If you’re still setting up, our step-by-step guide to starting POD on Etsy covers everything else.