Vsual Closing Down
After recently writing an article about Vsual here, I just received an email this morning stating that they are shutting down. The print-on-demand space is competitive and it's unfortunate to hear this news from Vsual. If you need to retrieve your files from Vsual, you should get that done before they close shop.
Dear VSUAL sellers,
It’s with a heavy heart that I write to inform you all that starting today, we will begin the gradual process of shutting down vsual.co. There are a number of reasons for which we made this decision, but the main one is this: While artists love our platform, we were never able to break into the competitive online print on demand marketplace space and find enough buyers for our business model to work. In addition to this, inflation has driven up the cost of printing, framing and shipping - meaning that we are currently putting our own money into the business to keep it running.
We are aware that many of you put lots of effort into building their VSUAL shops, which makes this even harder to announce. However, we are committed to making the process as smooth as possible, giving artists plenty of time to find an alternative venue to sell their artworks. Below you will find a detailed timeline of the important dates, as well as a number of links to alternative services and platforms you may want to consider for your print on demand needs.
Timeline:
February 10, 2023: The ability to create new shops will be disabled.
March 1, 2023: The vsual.co landing page and marketplace will be taken offline. Shop pages will still be accessible by direct link and embed, and buyers will still be able to purchase prints for a limited time. The admin interface will also remain accessible during this time.
April 1, 2023: Shop pages will be taken offline. Orders placed up until this day will be fulfilled, sales for all orders will be paid out, and the admin interface will continue to remain accessible for a short period.
April 15, 2023: The admin interface will be taken offline. VSUAL is officially shut down. Our contact email will remain available and we will continue to respond to any issues regarding orders.
Additional notes:
We have added a “download” button to the listing page in the admin interface. This allows artists to download the highest resolution version of the artwork that we have on file. We have heard from a few artists that they misplaced the files they had uploaded to VSUAL, and we want to make sure that no-one loses their artwork because we are shutting down.
We are so grateful to all the incredible artists who have used VSUAL over the years, and we wish you all the best as you keep making beautiful art. Please reach out with any questions you may have.
Best,Charlie | CEO & Founder