How to Hit $2K a Month Selling Vintage Nursery Prints (with Canva)

Selling vintage nursery prints is one of the easiest ways to make money online. Parents love timeless, storybook-style art, and with Canva, you don’t need to be a designer to create them.

What makes this side hustle so powerful is that prints are simple to design, easy to list, and completely passive once uploaded. But if you want to hit $2K a month, you can’t just upload a few random animals and hope for the best.

You need a strategy—a no-burnout design system, polished Etsy packaging, and consistent traffic from Pinterest or Instagram. With these, $2K a month isn’t just possible—it’s realistic.

Let’s walk through the exact steps to create vintage nursery prints that earn on repeat.

Why sell vintage nursery art ?

This niche works so well for a number of reasons:

• Parents will pay for the emotional impact → a cozy nursery, a personalized alphabet letter, or a woodland animal their child adores.

• Prints are easy to list and scale → on Etsy, Shopify, or even your own blog shop.

• Bundles raise your earning potential → alphabet packs, animal trios, or seasonal sets sell for higher prices.

• You can start seeing sales fast → much quicker than waiting for ad revenue to grow.

Step 1: Start Small (Don’t Try to Create Everything at Once)

Here’s the biggest mistake beginners make: they try to create an entire alphabet pack or 30 animals before even listing a single product. That’s a recipe for burnout. Instead, start with a handful of focused designs and build out from there.

Here’s a practical way to begin:

• Pick 3–5 letters → Choose popular initials like A, B, C, L, or M. (Parents often buy these first for nursery personalization.)

• Add 3–5 animals → Vintage favorites ( rabbit, duck, swan, bear, deer, butterflies )

• Experiment with 2–3 vintage extras → Floral overlays for girls, toy cars/stars/blocks for boys.

• Inspirational quotes in vintage typography e.g 'you are loved', or simply 'loved'

👉 With just 10–12 designs, you can already create multiple listings: single prints, sets of 3, or a “starter alphabet pack.” Once you see what’s selling, expand into the full A–Z or larger animal collections.

Step 2: Source or Create the Artwork

Most bestsellers on Etsy come from either public domain art or smart use of AI.

Option 1: Public Domain Vintage Illustrations

Browse free archives like:

• RawPixel → Botanical and animal collections.

• The Met Museum Open Access → Vintage art and drawings.

These sources are goldmines for animals, florals, and old alphabet styles you can refresh in Canva.

Option 2: AI

Want to speed things up? An AI tool like ideogram can generate vintage-style rabbits, elephants, or alphabet letters in seconds.

👉 Here’s an example: I typed in a simple prompt and got this vintage illustration. It was perfect on its own, but once polished in Canva and i added it to a mockup, it looks great and is sales-ready.

wfhharmony print and listing mockup

For the exact prompts and templates you can use to generate animal and alphabet sets, check out my premium starter pack.

Step 3: Polish, Package, and Export Like a Pro

So you've created stunning designs and youre almost ready to list. Its now time to make your files customer-ready. First you need to give buyers exactly what they need to print easily at home or at a shop.

1. Export high-resolution JPGs (300 DPI).

2. Save in multiple sizes:

   1. 8x10 in (also prints at 4x5, 16x20)

   2. 11x14 in (also prints at 5.5x7, 22x28)

   3. A4 (210 x 297 mm → also scales to A5, A3, A2)

   4. 16x20 in (also prints at 8x10, 4x5, 24x30)

      Buyers often get confused about what sizes their files can print at, so giving them scaling options in brackets makes your listing look more professional.

3. Group these into one ZIP folder per design so buyers get all sizes in a neat package.

4. Label clearly: e.g. Fox_Alphabet_Print_8x10.jpg, Fox_Alphabet_Print_A4.jpg.

👉 Pro tip: Offer “instant download” as a bundle (one design, four file sizes). It feels like more value but costs you nothing extra.

Step 4: Present with Stunning Mockups (This Is Where You Sell)

Your art might be beautiful, but if your Etsy listing photo is just a plain JPEG, it won’t sell. Shoppers need to see how it looks in a nursery.

That’s where mockups come in. Place your print into styled room photos — above a crib, on a rattan chair, or in a gallery wall. This turns your product from “digital file” into “oh wow, I can picture this in my child’s bedroom.”

👉 Shortcut: Instead of making your own, grab my Premium 9-piece Nursery Mockup Bundle now it's FREE.

Click to Download

Each template is unique, scroll stopping and Canva-ready, so you can just drag and drop your artwork into a frame. No Photoshop, no tech stress. It’s the fastest way to make your shop look professional from day one.

Step 5: List Your Prints for Sale

Where you sell matters:

• Etsy → fastest way to get in front of buyers who are already searching for nursery prints.

• Your blog shop (Shopify or WooCommerce) → better for long-term growth and building repeat customers.

Example Pricing:

• Single print: $3–$6

• Set of 3: $6–$15

👉 Bundles increase your average order value and help you reach $2K faster.

Step 6: Drive Traffic with Pinterest + Freebie

Parents are searching Pinterest daily for nursery inspiration. That’s where you’ll get most of your traffic.

• Pin styled mockups with text overlays like:

  • “Free Woodland Fox Print for Nursery”

  • “Vintage Alphabet Posters for Kids’ Rooms”

• Write SEO-friendly blog posts like:

  • “How to Print and Frame Nursery Wall Art for Under $10”

  • “Best Vintage Alphabet Prints for Children’s Bedrooms”

👉 Capture leads with a freebie:Offer 1 free nursery print or 1 free mockup template as a lead magnet. This grows your email list and gives you a warm audience to upsell your full bundles later.

Step 7: Scale to $2K a Month

Here’s how the math works:

• 5 single-print listings at $8.

• 5 bundles at $15–25.

• Each sells just 20 times a month.

That’s:

• $800 from single prints.

• $1,200 from bundles.Total = $2,000/month.

Remember: once your listings are live, they keep selling without extra effort. The upfront work of creating, polishing, and mocking up your art pays you over and over again.

Final Thoughts

Selling vintage nursery prints with Canva is one of those rare side hustles that’s creative, beginner-friendly, and genuinely profitable. The key is not just uploading any old animal picture, but making your art stand out: combine animals with letters and vintage details, package them in multiple sizes, and show them off in beautiful nursery mockups.

Start small — a handful of letters, a few animals, and some simple overlays — and grow from there. Before you know it, you’ll have a full set of alphabet animals, seasonal nursery packs, and a shop that feels polished and professional.

👉 Ready to fast-track your shop? Grab my free nursery mockup sample here.👉 Or, if you’re serious about hitting $2K, get the full Nursery Mockup Bundle and start creating listings that sell today.