Etsy taps Chief Growth Officer as CEO to navigate the AI era

Online marketplace Etsy Inc. will elevate Chief Growth Officer Kruti Patel Goyal to the CEO job, entrusting the company veteran with navigating the artificial intelligence era.

Josh Silverman, the current chief executive officer, is set to hand the reins to Goyal after eight years in the role, Etsy said on Wednesday. She becomes CEO on Jan. 1, when she will also join the board.

Goyal, 49, is taking over an e-commerce business that has suffered slowing growth in recent years. Revenue is projected to rise just 1% in 2025 — a sharp deceleration from a pandemic-fueled sales boom five years ago.

“As customer needs continue to evolve, Etsy will too,” Goyal said in a statement. “But we’ll do it in a way that stays true to who we are, leaning into what makes us different: human connection, our sellers’ creativity and a distinctly personal shopping experience.”

Goyal has worked at New York-based Etsy since 2012. She started on seller and product teams, eventually becoming chief product officer in 2019. Goyal then took over as CEO of Depop in 2022 after Etsy acquired the secondhand marketplace for $1.6 billion the previous year.

She spent almost three years leading Depop before returning to Etsy’s main business earlier this year. Etsy and Depop operate independently.

“I asked Kruti to come back to Etsy at the beginning of this year, with an eye to her having the right skills to be the person to lead the business,” Silverman said in an interview. “She’s already been laying the foundation here, relaying our strategic priorities, changing our leadership team and driving machine learning and matching.”

Silverman will remain executive chair through the end of 2026 to ensure a smooth transition, said the company, which is known for offering handmade goods and unusual gifts.

Etsy wants to use AI to help consumers and sellers avoid the online shopping world’s “sea of sameness,” Silverman said.

“We think Etsy is uniquely positioned to win in AI,” he said. “We have really unique inventory and a strong engineering culture that can keep up.”