bkay

We are all on a budget and need to find good deals to maintain our hobby. However, criticizing the local quilt shop prices is not fair.

Quilt shops have high overheads. They pay taxes on, not only on the building (whether they own it or not) and their inventory. They have to maintain extensive sales records because they have to collect sales taxes and remit them to the state (They don't get paid to do tax forms, although they usually have to pay an accountant to fill out the forms.) They have employees they must pay. For every dollar they pay their employees, they fork over about 10 cents to the government in employment taxes. Then, there's vacation and holidays where the employee doesn't work, but must be paid anyway. At least in Texas, where I live, small businesses pay a lot more for electricity than the consumer does. They pay 3 to 4% of their sales to the credit card companies to process your credit card. I'm sure there are more overhead items than these, too.

Do you know of any local quilt shop owner who is getting rich? If they were getting rich, they wouldn't be going out of business in droves. If the businesses were really profitable, someone would buy them, rather than them going out of business.

They aren't gouging anyone on prices. They're just trying to make a living doing something they once enjoyed.

That said, I probably spend 5% of my quilting dollars in a LQS. I can find better deals on most items than I can get at the LQS, and I take advantage of it.

I'm just saying we should not criticize them for their prices. Just be grateful they are there for you when you spend 95% of your dollars elsewhere.

I predict that before long, they will all go the way of the local family owned shoe store, dress shop and bookstore.

bkay