Why It Was Time to Close My TPT Store

I can’t remember how I found out about the website, but I joined Teachers Pay Teachers (TPT) in 2009. Before I started on TPT, I wrote science articles for EdHelper for a few years. I thought it was a good idea and concept for teachers to sell their personal curriculum creations for money. One of my first products was my Disguise A Turkey Activity that I did as a project with one of my classes. It was and still is one of my best selling products. Now that I’ve entered my 30th summer vacation, I made a huge decision–this is the perfect time to close my TPT store.

My TPT Beginning…

In the beginning, my store, Chalkspot Teacher Store (formerly Chalkspot.com), was successful. I was a small seller, but I was able to place very high in the search listings. In addition, I was able to get advertising space for my store on TPT’s website. My desk tags were appearing on the first three pages of the search results. I was making decent money. It wasn’t in the thousands of dollars, but it was still a good amount of money. I added about 120 products to my store within 6 years.

As time passed, it became harder for me to get advertising space on TPT’s calendar. I even checked recently: the last time I was lucky enough to get advertising space was 2014. Even though I still earned money for my products, the amount was decreasing each year.

I started to realize that between TPT’s yearly fee and the percentage they take for each product sold, I was operating at a loss. By this time I also had my own website for my store. For the amount of effort I was putting in to maintain my TPT store without advertising on their site, I could use that same effort to maintain my own site and earn just as much. I already advertise on social media for both sites.

The Big Decision

My final decision came after TPT became part of IXL. The site that was once there for teachers with small stores, now has become a corporation that benefits larger stores. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that other teachers can still earn large amounts of money for their products on TPT. I just realized that it was time to close my TPT store and focus on my own website.

So, starting today, all Chalkspot Teacher Store products are only available and sold on my store website. My store has a Points and Rewards system and multiple ways to pay. Thank you to everyone who has supported my store on TPT all of these years. I hope you will continue to support my store website.