Originally Posted by
Mimi Sews
Thank you for your input, everyone. I was browsing etsy shops last night and saw quilts listed for large amounts of money, so I was curious about how well they sold on there. I figured it was too good to be true. I didn't realize you could check to see what items were sold by a certain seller...good to know. I guess I will explore my local market options.
Out of the past couple years when I was checking in periodically with who sold higher priced quilts on etsy, there was one person who was a multi-award winning quilter at AQS & IQF shows who sold a quilt in the hundreds of dollars. Even still, based on the quality of his work & how much hand work was involved, he still wasn't getting paid much for his time. I know $1000 sounds like a lot to get for making a crib quilt, but it really isn't when you consider it could take nearly 100 hours to make the quilt. My crib quilts average 10,000 stitches at 15 stitches per inch, all done by hand via needle turn. I've been doing needlework for over 20 years & am quite quick at it, but it still takes me 30-40 hours per quilt to cut, mark & sew all those tiny pieces. Add in cutting, piecing, pressing, custom quilting & binding -- not to mention time to design, launder, tie up in a pretty ribbon & ship -- and I'm easily at 90-100 hours ... meaning that even a $1200 price tag only gets me $11-12/hour ($22-24,000/year). So it's not the windfall that it seems when you just consider the total sales price. Even many of the best quiltmakers often don't make more than $25/hour and end up supplementing their income by writing books, teaching classes, designing patterns/fabrics/notions, or running a shop.
You might check with your local quilt guilds or LQS. Sometimes people will call up a guild or shop asking either to commission a quilt or to buy a ready-made quilt. I know our guild gets requests 3-4x/year for commissions & on occasion for ready made quilts. After a bad experience with commissions, I now only sell quilts that I've completed.
Two quick tips (because I always love when people want to enter the industry!):
1. For baby quilts, you'll sell more if you make them 100% cotton & market to grandparents.
2. Make sure you add 20% to the list price for your quilts with Quilts for Sale to cover their commission.
Best wishes with finding a great partner to sell your quilts!
Bree