Boot in the butt....no
Just an easier way to get to direct visitors and members to the shop. Entreprenureship is hard work and let no one tell you any differently. Taking the leap to put the store together was hurdle #1. Now it's up to promoting what you have, getting new stuff ready to list, Sell a few things and take care of their delivery. And doing all of this at the same time. It's the circle of a retailers life!
I'm going t ask a few of my geek squad friends to tweek a few of their sites (I hope about 30) with your RSS feed and were going to need to talk about those other methods of communication you say you don't dabble in. I think if you might want to reconsider the positive impact this could have.
It wouldn't any of the other members to put a link in the footers of their email either. Just think of how many views this would get in a weeks time.
Something to think about
TKO