The country manager of Etsy Australia has left after six months in the role.

Jason Chuck, former VP of international for eHarmony, was appointed as country manager of the online marketplace in July 2013.

Chuck’s appointment was part of the US-based company’s push to build its presence in Australia.

Founded in the US in 2005, Etsy has grown from a niche marketplace for creative buyers and sellers to a global e-commerce giant.

Dubbed “a crafty cross between Amazon and eBay”, Etsy has increased its number of local staff members, mainly in marketing and business development, as well as opened an office in Melbourne.

Prior to the appointment of Jason Chuck as country manager, the Australian and NZ arm was overseen by core markets manager, Nicole Vanderbilt, who is based in London.

At the time of his appointment Chuck told Inside Retail PREMIUM that despite not having had many people on the ground, Australia is in the company’s top five markets, with the site seeing around onemillion unique page views a month.

“The site now has close to 18 million unique items so there really is something for everyone, and this has people realising that it’s becoming a little bit more mass market,”Chuck  said.

Etsy Australia told Inside Retail a replacement has not yet been named.