I try to shop the sales only for fabric. Every once in a while I fall in love with a particular line of fabric, but at the end of the season it ends up on sale. Its pretty fun to hunt around online for fabric because there are always such great sales. Shopping online for fabric also gives you great search opportunities through Google to find the best price and even the widest varieties of fabric.

i'm always amazed by the wide range of prices charged by different vendors for the same lines of fabrics.

i got one on sale for $3 per yard. most other shops are still clinging to $8.99 per yard for the same line. obviously, the first shop put it on sale because it wasn't moving.

i guess the other shops would rather let it turn to dust on their shelves than part with it for less than full price. go figure. :lol:

The problem is, at that price they aren't even getting their investment back to put into something else! Do it too many times with too much fabric and the LQS will be out of business.

i'm not suggesting they sell their whole stock at a loss.

however, if something isn't moving, and they don't reduce the price at all, they get nothing for it.

that math is no good, either.

There is often another dynamic at work here. After a year or so, fabric distributors will close out fabric remaining on their shelves at really low prices.

That's how some stores can sell stuff at prices that are much lower than can shops who bought the same stock when it was new. There are web stores who deal in nothing but older manufacturers' closeouts. They're not selling this fabric at a loss, however, if shops who bought it when it was new sold it for the same prices, they would be.

i know all that. it's beside my point.

i repeat ... selling something that's only been gathering dust for more than a year at cost or below will generate more income than stubbornly letting it continue to gather dust.

You're definitely correct about inventory turn being important. And as a shop owner, I fully agree with you on that. However, selling at a loss is always difficult, even though sometimes we have to do it just to recapture some of the money that's tied up in inventory.

I've noticed that a lot of B&M stores tend to keep a lot of old inventory just to fill up space on the store shelves, as well as to offer a wider range of shades and color choices. And lots of fabrics really never go out of style.

What is really frustrating is when quilt magazines come out with new patterns for fabrics that have been out for a long time and then you can't find (or in the case of the shop owner) are out of some of the fabrics required, and they're no longer stocked by the distributor/manufacturer. It would really be nice sometimes if there was more coordination between the fabric introduction and the projects that use them.

You don't know how lucky you are to be able to buy fabric at what would be considered a good deal (at $10.99) here. Good quality quilting cotton is twice that price here! I often order from the States online, pay the shipping and the difference in the dollar, and still come out ahead. For me, quilting is an indulgence.

Sometimes I am absolutely thrilled to find an "older" piece of fabric on a shelf - good design is good design - no matter how old or new it is.

Ditto in north central FL. 8-)