I think it's a matter of doing as you say; pre shop and then knowing the manufacturer. I know what you mean; depending on your monitor it's hard to tell what color some of the things are. I haven't bought too much online since I've been pretty lucky at getting what I want locally. I save my receipts from one store and for every 150 I spend I get up to $15 yard of fabric for free. Another store I save my receipts and after 250 I get $25 gift card. It takes longer to get things there but since I'm buying it's nice that the computer keeps track and gives me a card when I reach a certain limit.

Two weeks ago I finished a quilt top pre-borders. I wanted to use a medium brown with black in it. I knew I had it, searched through every shelf and storage bucket I own and could not find it. I bought it at Joann's a while ago and they no longer have it. I found a 2 inch wide strip and started looking online at Connecting Threads. I buy a lot of stuff from them, not just fabric. I found a fabric there called chocolate. It matched the strip I was comparing perfectly. I ordered it on Sunday and it arrived on Wednesday. I couldn't believe how perfect it was. I put the borders on last week and it's great. I've found Connecting Threads online fabric to be very close to the fabric in person. I've never been disappointed. P.S. The quilt with my original brown fabric from Joann's is hanging on the wall going up my stairs. I knew I bought it!

I only buy sales online to build my stash.
The exception is Connecting Treads. They are so reasonable that I like to buy charm packs to see the true fabrics. Then if I like them I will order the fabrics for a project. I like to order charm packs of the same line three at a time and enough yardage for borders. Also order $50 dollars so no freight charges. I dont make bed sized quilts often as I dont have storage for them. I like alot of variety sewing so small quilts keep my interest.

I have ordered online and once the fabric came it was definatly not what I expected, but was still useable and at a very good price so everything worked out in the end anyway.

I just ordered fabric online for the first time from Connecting Threads. I purposely ordered charm packs from several of their collections. They were very reasonably priced and great for table runners and now I have a sample from lots of their lines. I also ordered some fabric by the yard and was very impressed with the quality. I will be ordering from them again for sure. Like you I was intimidated at first but their service was great and shipping was almost free. It would have been if I lived in the U.S. but they only charged me $7.00 to ship to Canada. Good luck!

I shop on line and love it, so far every order was at least the size I ordered or some times they gave me a few extra inches. I had to call in the last two times because my credit card no. was wrong, but when I repeated it, they said it must have been a typo on their part. Made me a little nervous, so if it happens again I will question them about it. Their phone people are the best. Having said that, yesterday an order came witch was supposed to be pink with white teddy bears on it. Well it`s lavender. I`m only making pillow cases for the great grand kids to use in the car when traveling, so that would be O.K. if I had the trim and cuff colors to match, Hate to go to LQS, HA HA

I use EBAY to find fabrics from a certain line as backing or boarders for quilts made of some kind of precut that is now hard to find. I've never had a problem with quality but I do stay away from precuts that are done by the seller. I'm not sure that their prices are any better than your LQS, but i can find almost anything I need.

You don't unless you have seen it in the stores previously, this is why I will only buy fabric i have seen in a shop because i have bought several fabrics that turned out to be different colors than they looked online, from fabric.com and other sites. But if you already know because you have seen it in a shop then you have no worries or wasted dollars on fabric you can't use, also a good reason to support your LQS

I buy most of my fabric online. I think there is one one nstance that I had to return fabric but it was my fault for not reading what it was. Some Co. offer free shipping and no sales tax. It is much cheapoer than going to a LQS taking into consideration the price of gas.

I have ordered tons of fabric and have never been dissappointed in any of it. Mostly from Hancock's of Paducah. They are very good. I did have to match a piece of purple in a quilt for the backing so entered the name of the fabric on google and it brought it up from several sites. The least expensive was Patsy Thompson's. Ordered it and it was perfect! so good results all around on that. I too cannot afford to drive all over (nearest shop is 40 miles) looking for the right color so enjoy looking online. Good luck!