As long as I had to talk to you about the SBOW I thought I would give you another tease…Linda is actually quilting it and she says its her favorite quilt that she has done for me so far…so with that said…here is the peek…
I just love these blocks…now here is what I wanted to say…We are getting some of our very loyal walk in customers MAD at us about not being able to prepay for their the SBOW. Some of them to the point of calling my girls Bitches! Really???? These girls are anything but Bitches!!! They try to explain and reason with the people who don’t understand how it works…just because they may not like the fact that they can not manipulate it to how they want it to work does not make my girls bitches! By the way..this was not everyone who was upset but just two of them and they call themselves quilters??? Remember girls…this is supposed to be FUN! I know I personally could not take this from customers…I guess that is why I am stitching and designing. But remember we are all just trying to do our jobs the best we can…and they are just following the rules of the program.
Now we have set up the PREPAY OPTION for those being shipped for the following reasons…
If we have to enter the cc numbers for all those SBOW going out each week it costs a lot of time/which is labor…this is eliminated with a prepay….we have no one working up in the store for hours on end running people through who walk in the door…we have time for you…we are there to help you with anything you wish..
The discount we have given is NOT on the SBOW it is on their shipping costs.They have to pay at the minim $56 more than the girls who can walk in our door, so we have taken off about $15 for this…and because the volume of our shipping goes up so much during the summer, we get bigger shipping discounts and we are just passing this on to those who have to use the shipping method and cannot walk through the door.
I am sure they would gladly give up a shipping discount to be able to walk in our door each week…now don’t take that as I have a big head…but I just hear it all the time at shows that they wish they could come to the shop just even once…
We do not have the room or want the pressure of trying to keep track of blocks if you do not come in to pick them up each week…we give out the FREEBIE each week so you do come in and don’t miss it…you have the options to prepay for the following week if you know you are on vacation or something and cannot come in…We want you in the shop each week…we want to see you, visit with you, help you with what you are working on and hopefully you may purchase a little more than just the SBOW…that really is why I do this…it is not a secret…our business slows down dramatically during the summer…I still have the same bills and the same payroll as the rest of the year and 8 years ago started the SBOW to make sure I didn’t fall short…and so far it has worked. FYI.. we cut 1800 freebies each week we have the material cost and the labor costs for this…everyone who purchases each week in the shop gets one as well if you order online. Now 1800 freebies…think about that…they are free to you for being a great customer, they are not only for those who are in the SBOW’s.
I also know that I have upped the price this year on the wool appliqué one…but really it is the much more reasonable than previous years…you will be finishing your quilt each week. At the end you will not only have 12 blocks…you will have 25 and an optional reasonably priced wool appliqué border which I have discounted for everyone.…which by the way just contains scrappiness of the quilt and harmonizes everything for a wonderful quilt. You will love this quilt! I can see it entered in shows winning prizes!!!
We try so hard to run a great program…we never want anyone upset with us or think we are not being fair…We work with a lot of people who lose jobs, and other situations which come up…We love our customers…Try to put yourself in our shoes…we are talking about 1000 customers for this event. This is kind of a nightmare that we somehow figure out how to work it…we have hired extra college girls to help us and this gives them a good job instead of bar tending until wee hours of the night…or flipping whammies at McD’s…
Hopefully this will reach those who are not happy with us and they will understand a little better and maybe apologize to my girls…but to those of you who continue to spend your hard earned bucks and totally understand that we are here for you… know that we appreciate you!
One more thing…I will be posting a little more about the pieced SBOW…some think it is patriotic…but it has blacks, pinks, browns, grays, dull greens all the colors as well as reds and blues, so please don’t judge it from the 1st weeks blocks…its fun and awesome to piece it…plus their will be a bonus with the leftovers!
Now just because you read all of this…I am going to show you another block…sorry can’t help myself…Stitch On my friends….LB
PS…I am trying to get the 10th Anniversary Stitch-Along done now that Quilt Market is over…so that will be coming soon too…free online patterns for all!
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