Martha Makes Her Move — To Amazon

Few could have predicted home-maker extraordinaire Martha Stewart’s path over the past several years — from household name in interior decorating to insider trader to celebrity cause célèbre. Now, Martha has made another move that could land her and Amazon big results.

The New York Times reported that Stewart has officially left her partnership with American Made, eBay’s Esty-like homemade goods marketplace, for Amazon’s equivalent platform — Handmade. Citing a larger audience and the capability to spread her goods wider and farther than ever before, Stewart told NYT that she is ready to bring Amazon’s nascent Handmade service to the next level.

“It’s a much bigger audience,” Stewart told NYT. “It’s the powerhouse retailer online in the United States. It’s a step in the right direction, I think, to showcase the vast number of entrepreneurial small companies in the United States. And some of these companies might become the giants of tomorrow.”

The addition of a marquee name like Stewart’s should help Amazon drive interest in goods on Handmade during the holiday shopping season. In a different report, NYT noted that Amazon is still trying to drum up traffic for its newly launched platform, which features a more personal approach to eCommerce — in stark comparison to Amazon’s ubiquitous, all-encompassing regular marketplace.

“For the first time on Amazon, we’re going to have a picture of the artist, a little icon of what state they’re from, what country they’re from,” Peter Faricy, vice president at Amazon in charge of Handmade, told NYT. “We’re going to launch with an experience that’s very different. Customers are going to see the difference.”

It’s unclear what ultimate effect bringing in such a mainstream name like Stewart’s will do for the burgeoning brand’s authentic and grassroots messaging, but in the chase for the almighty dollar, it sure can’t hurt to try it out.