New maker marketplace connects buyers and sellers

By Heather Hamilton, contributing writer

Image source: DesignSpark Marketplace.

RS Components recently unveiled a new platform aimed at the design community and, more specifically, small businesses and makers. Still in its beta version, DesignSpark Marketplace invites users to sell and market their products to an audience of their peers, which includes the 650,000 members of RS DesignSpark’s engineering community.

DesignSpark launched in 2010, offering libraries, educational resources, free tools for mechanical, electrical, and PCB design, and a platform for sharing designs. The marketplace also provides a place for makers to publish related product articles, broadening the opportunities for exposure to new markets.

Mike Bray, head of DesignSpark at RS, notes that design professionals often struggle to get their product in front of potential customers for testing before they begin mass production and hopes to change that with DesignSpark Marketplace. “DesignSpark Marketplace is an innovative solution that enables makers and many others to list their products and promote them to a very wide audience,” said Bray in a press release. “DesignSpark Marketplace also completes the concept-to-creation-to-market process for engineers, meaning that DesignSpark now helps engineers design, promote, and sell their products across a single platform.”

While the creators don’t place a lot of rules on makers regarding potential products, they must be related to electronics or 3D printing and be original creations by individuals or businesses. Sellers are free to offer as many products as they’d like, though buyers are only allowed one at a time. For an order of multiple items, buyers will need to purchase via several transactions. The press release notes that this can include products ranging from add-on boards like Raspberry Pi and Arduino for single computers to standalone projects, wearables, and items that have been 3D-printed.

The platform is free for buyers and sellers and seeks to give other makers the first opportunity to purchase products before they hit a larger market. They will not collect a fee from sellers, although they utilize PayPal and Stripe, which have a fee added. Sellers ship directly to buyers and can set their own rules about international shipping and associated costs.

DesignSpark Marketplace appears to be part of a larger initiative to provide free resources to designers and is now included in the DesignSpark Toolbox app, which provides an easy way for designers to access DesignSpark’s tools, including calculators, converters, and more. Unsurprisingly, users can also access the marketplace via the app, which promises extended functionality over previous similar products.