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If you’re reading this Gold City Ventures review, you’re probably already interested in selling printables on Etsy and you’re trying to decide whether the E-Printables course is worth your money. Fair question. $247 isn’t nothing, especially when you’re just starting out.
Here’s my honest position upfront. I’ve been through Gold City’s free printables workshop — so I know their teaching style and how they explain the business — but I haven’t taken the full paid E-Printables course myself. So this review is part first-hand (the free workshop) and part research: I’ve read a lot of student reviews, studied what’s inside the course from the outside, and looked at the results their students report. I’ll be clear about which is which as we go.
I’m also building my own Etsy printables shop right now, running it on the same free guides I publish here. When I’ve got enough of my own results to add, I’ll update this review. For now, here’s what I’ve found.
Quick Verdict
The Gold City Ventures E-Printables course is a structured, step-by-step program for people who want to create and sell printables on Etsy. It’s designed for complete beginners with no design experience, and it covers everything from finding a profitable niche to designing products in Canva to listing and selling on Etsy.
It’s worth it if you’re serious about building a printables side hustle and you want a clear path to follow rather than piecing together free advice from YouTube videos and blog posts. It’s not worth it if you’re looking for a magic button — you still have to put in the work.
Who’s Behind Gold City Ventures?
The course was created by Julie Berninger and Cody Berman back in 2019. Julie is a mom and former Amazon engineering manager who started selling printables on Etsy as a side hustle. Cody is a former corporate banker who had no design experience when he started — and made over $700 in his first week selling printables around Valentine’s Day.
Between them, they’ve built multiple Etsy shops and created Gold City Ventures to teach the process to others. Gold City says its students have collectively earned over $3.3 million selling printables — that’s their own reported figure. Julie herself has been profiled in a CNBC Make It feature on her income streams, and the founders have turned up in outlets like Forbes.
The point is they’re not anonymous course creators hiding behind a logo. They’re real people with real, still-active Etsy shops, and they’re active in the course’s community.
Free Training: Earn Money Selling Digital Printables
Not sure what to create or where to start? Gold City Ventures’ free workshop walks you through what sells, how to design it, and how to get your first sale
What’s Inside the Course
The E-Printables course covers the full journey from zero to a working Etsy printables shop. Based on my research, here’s what the course walks you through:
Finding your niche and product ideas. The course starts with how to research what’s actually selling on Etsy, how to identify profitable niches, and how to come up with product ideas that have real demand. They include a long list of product ideas to get you started.
Designing printables in Canva. Step-by-step tutorials on creating professional-looking printables using Canva, even with zero design experience. The course includes over-the-shoulder video tutorials showing exactly how to build products from scratch.
Keyword research and Etsy SEO. How to find the right keywords, write titles and tags that get your listings found, and understand how Etsy’s search algorithm works. Multiple reviewers have specifically called out the keyword research module as one of the most valuable parts of the course.
Setting up and branding your Etsy shop. How to set up your shop properly from the start — shop name, policies, branding, and creating a professional-looking storefront.
Listing and selling. How to create listings that convert, set the right prices, and create listing images that make buyers click.
Scaling and marketing. How to grow beyond your first few sales, including tips on marketing your shop and expanding your product line.
The lessons are primarily video-based, with most running between 5 and 20 minutes. The course is self-paced — Gold City Ventures recommends about 4 weeks to complete it, but you can go faster or slower depending on your schedule.
Recommended reading: How to Make Printables to Sell — if you want to understand the creation process before committing to a course.
What You Get Beyond the Lessons
The course isn’t just video lessons. You also get:
30+ done-for-you Canva templates. These are professionally designed templates you can customize and list in your shop. This is a genuine shortcut — instead of spending days figuring out how to design your first product, you can have something listed within hours.
A private community. Gold City Ventures runs a Facebook group for members where students share wins, ask questions, and get feedback. Multiple reviewers mention this community as one of the most valuable parts of the membership. Experienced students often help newer ones, and Julie and Cody are active in the group.
The 100 Sales Club. When you hit 100 sales, Gold City Ventures sends you a prize in the mail and you keep free VIP Membership. It’s a small thing, but it creates a culture of celebration and momentum in the community.
Ongoing updates. The course content gets updated over time, so you’re not stuck with outdated advice as Etsy’s platform evolves.
Lifetime access. You never lose access to the course itself, so you can come back and reference specific modules whenever you need to.
Real Student Results
This is the part that matters most — so let me be clear about where these come from. All of the results below are pulled straight from Gold City Ventures’ own success-stories page. They’re the company’s own testimonials, not numbers I’ve independently verified, so read them as “what’s possible,” not “what’s typical.”
The bigger wins. One student, Naomi P., reports consistently making $3,000–$5,000 a month and passing $100,000 in total Etsy sales. Sasha, who runs the budgeting shop Your Frugal Friend, is now a top 1% Etsy seller with tens of thousands of sales. Others report wedding and planner shops with tens of thousands of sales each. These are the standout stories Gold City features — they’re real testimonials, but they’re the highlights, not the average.
The fast starters. Gold City also highlights quicker early wins — Jennifer H. hitting 100 sales with her shop open just 49 days, Sam C. landing 3 sales within about a week and a half of starting, and Laura M. making a sale on the very first product she listed.
The honest perspective. Not every student hits these numbers, and Gold City is upfront that results aren’t guaranteed. The students who do well are the ones who follow the process, keep creating, and don’t quit after the first week. Treat the success stories as a sign of what consistent work can build — not a promise.
Recommended reading: How Much Can You Make Selling Printables? — realistic income expectations beyond just the success stories.
Pricing: What It Costs
The standard price for the E-Printables course is $247.
It’s sometimes available for less — around $197 — if you join through the free workshop or catch one of their open-enrollment launches. I’d budget for $247, though, since the discount isn’t always on. There’s also an optional VIP membership ($29/month) after a trial period, which you can keep or cancel — and it becomes free if you hit the 100 Sales Club while it’s active.
Is $247 a lot? It depends on how you look at it. If you sell just 25–30 printables at $7–$8 each, you’ve made back the cost of the course. Some reviewers report recouping the investment within their first couple of months.
Compared to other Etsy printables courses on the market, Gold City Ventures sits at a mid-range price point. Some courses charge more for less content. And the inclusion of 30+ Canva templates adds real practical value — those alone could take you weeks to create from scratch.
Recommended reading: How to Price Printables on Etsy — understanding pricing helps you see how quickly you can recoup the investment.
Who It’s For
The E-Printables course is a good fit if you’re a complete beginner with no design experience who wants a structured path from zero to a working Etsy shop. It’s also worth it if you’ve been trying to figure it out on your own and you’re not making progress — sometimes having someone lay out the exact steps saves you months of trial and error.
It’s also worth considering if you learn better from video tutorials than from reading blog posts. The over-the-shoulder format makes it easy to follow along.
Who It’s Not For
If you’re already selling printables successfully on Etsy and making consistent sales, you probably don’t need this course. The content is aimed at beginners and early-stage sellers.
If you’re not willing to put in the work — creating products, listing them, learning Etsy SEO, and being patient while your shop builds traction — no course will help you. This isn’t a shortcut to easy money. It’s a shortcut to knowing what to do, but you still have to do it.
And if you’re not sure whether selling printables is even right for you, start with the free workshop before spending $247. The workshop gives you a solid overview of the business model with no commitment — it’s exactly where I started.
Recommended reading: How to Sell Printables on Etsy — the free version of getting started, if you want to try before investing in a course.
Free Training: Earn Money Selling Digital Printables
Not sure what to create or where to start? Gold City Ventures’ free workshop walks you through what sells, how to design it, and how to get your first sale
What I’d Improve
No review is honest if it’s all praise. Here are the things I’d like to see:
More on Pinterest marketing. Several reviewers have mentioned wanting more detail on driving traffic from Pinterest. The course touches on marketing but could go deeper on this specific channel, which is one of the most effective for printable sellers.
AI integration guidance. AI is changing how people create products — tools like ChatGPT and AI image generators are everywhere now, and Etsy has been tightening its stance on AI and content disclosure. Updated guidance on how to use these tools responsibly would be valuable.
Third-party keyword research tools. The course covers Etsy’s built-in search tools, but some reviewers have noted they’d like more instruction on external tools like eRank or EverBee for deeper keyword analysis.
These are relatively minor points — the core course content is solid and well-reviewed. But they’re worth mentioning if you’re making a purchase decision.
Gold City Ventures Review – Final Verdict
The Gold City Ventures E-Printables course is a solid, well-structured program for beginners who want to start selling printables on Etsy. The combination of video lessons, done-for-you templates, keyword research training, and an active community makes it one of the more complete offerings in this space.
It’s not magic. You still have to create products, list them, and be patient. But if you’re the kind of person who does better with a clear plan than with piecing things together from scattered free resources, this course gives you that plan.
My recommendation: start with the free workshop. It’s the part I’ve been through myself, and it gives you a genuine feel for Julie and Cody’s teaching style and the business model. If it resonates, the full course is the natural next step.
I’ll update this review as my own shop develops. For now, the free workshop is the honest first step — start there, and decide from your own experience whether the paid course is worth it.
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