Mary Stire

A bout 2-3 yrs ago I had heard that Wal mart was reducing the size of the craft departments and selling only pre-cut lengths of fabric. When they put in the super Walmarts here the craft dept. were smaller.But they are still cutting fabric. I went into a Big Lots last yr. and found pre- cut fabric packaged for Walmart, but only that one time. I am lucky here . I have access to Jo-Anns , Hobby Lobby, and several good quilt shops. In some areas all there is are Walmarts.

Mary in Louisiana :D

Knot Sew

I live in upstate Queensbury NY I asked the manager of the fabric dept. she said this one is staying open. Some in the south will be closing.

dforseth

Here is a link to the Wal-Mart home office where you can leave online feed back about the company or your local store. http://walmartstores.com/GlobalWMStoresWeb/navigate.do?catg=221 Just click on submit feed back for our corporate headquarters.

Hope this helps.

Debbie

DonnaRae

I found a petition online to stop the closing of Walmat fabric Depts. This is the site if you are interested. http://www.petitiononline.com/savefab/petition.html
I aslo wrote a letter to the CEO. I live in a county (which is not very large) in which I am located just in the right spot. I can go to four Walmarts. Some are kinda far, but I go just to check out the fabric. All the sales people know me and not one of them has heard of Walmart downsizing the department. But to be sure I did a letter to the CEO of the company, advising of the petition, and that it is very demorilizing for personal to hear about downsizing from customers before hearing it from Walmart themselves. I first heard it from customers telling the Walmart staff. The only response to date was I was informed that the downsizing would be packaging of misc. items ie: batting etc.... Not downsizing of personal. I do not know what is true, but again maybe you want to go to the web site and sign the petition and prehaps notify the CEO also. You can do that by going to the Co. Walmart website. That is how I did it. Hope this helps. :roll:

ceannastahr

I talked to my friends at Wal-Mart I go to, unfourtunley my Wal-Mart is one of the ones that will closing the fabric department. I was told its a promotional thing they are picking Wal-Mart in various areas they are replacing the department with party goods. No employees will lose there jobs. This will be starting within the next 6 months to as lonf as 2 years.

DonnaRae

Again, perhaps if you and others go to the petition and in fact state that Walmart maybe we can make a change. Not likely but it most certainly can not hurt to try! :cry:

ceannastahr

I was just checking my email and found this message regarding the message I left them yesterday on thier customer service site:

Thank you for your message.

Thank you for you recent inquiry regarding the fabric department in your local store. In keeping with our emphasis on being a store of the community, Wal-Mart is converting the fabrics and crafts department in some stores to a newly expanded assortment of merchandise that focuses on life's celebrations. We are thrilled to offer our customers this exciting new crafts and celebrations center that makes available craft and party planning needs along with information on current trends and new ideas in the area of life's celebrations, such as holidays, weddings and birthdays.

In those stores where the new crafts and celebrations center is placed, merchandise commonly referred to as 'notions' will be included in the product offerings - such as sewing machines, yarn, needles, thread, etc. As a part of this conversion, most of our new and remodeled stores opening in early 2007, as well as a small number of existing stores, will feature the new crafts and celebrations center in place of cut fabrics. Wal-Mart will continue to carry cut fabric in most of our stores. Due to the continued evaluation of our stores, we are unable to share a list of existing stores scheduled to receive the new crafts and celebrations center at this time.

Thank you,
Wal-Mart Customer Relations

KATHY D

One of our Walmarts has already downsized. The other one I talked to today and they were told within 1-3 years. They also will only go to prepackaged items. They are replacing them with wedding merchandise. Walmart thinks they can pick up more business. She said they were sadly mistaken, as they sell lots of fabric and notions.

k_jupiter

I would be interested to know, how many communities where these Walmarts are located had small fabric shops before the 800 lb gorilla moved in? How many chose Walmart because it was cheaper?

Just curious. I am lucky to have 4 or 5 Walmarts I don't go to, as well as a half dozen quilt shops, and one or two Hancock Fabric stores around. I usually only patronize my local quilts shops, the advice given is worth the price differential.

I know it doesn't help all of you in remote areas of the country, but perhaps you can start getting your local qult guilds together and do shopping trips together. 45 minutes discussing the latest piecing technique makes the drive go much faster. Meetings oon wheels.

tim in san jose

Norah

Amen, Tim!! We all love those low prices and most of us are guilty of going to WalMart to save money. After the mom and pop businesses are gone, where else are we going to shop? And when there is nowhere else, will WalMart still be cheap? We will be at their mercy, as we are with this fabric department closure. I thank you for the reminder. I've been spending too much at WalMart lately.