Sarah Feingold was at Skidmore today talking about her career & how she became the first General Counsel at Etsy. Sarah had been a jeweler since she was 12. She decided to attend Skidmore College because she wanted to major in something other than metalsmithing, but still wanted to continue to make jewelry. Sarah majored in Business and the went to law school. Even in law school, she took graduate-level metalsmithing classes.
Sarah found out about Etsy when she was working at a law firm post-law school. She was finishing up her ebook, “Copyright for Artists,” and was selling jewelry on Etsy. She loved Etsy’s core qualities, & what it’s all about: it empowers people to make a living making things & trying to be green. She also noticed that Etsy’s legal compliance was non-existent. So she called the founder & told him she thought she could help. She sent her resume to the CEO, Robert Kalin & convinced him to hire her as General Counsel. He hired her on the spot.
She moved to Brooklyn and started working on her own laptop to help launch Etsy. Etsy went public on April 16, 2015. The company’s valuation was $1.8 billion. Etsy raised $237 million in IPO proceeds.
Entrepreneurship 
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