Where Do You Hunt For The Cheapst of Cheap Fabrics?
 

Do you hunt down fabrics that cost less than $2-3/yd? If so, where are your favorite haunts?

Well, for me it's thrift stores, estate sales, and Craig's list. I'm typically paying about $1-2/yard or maybe up to $2/pound. Part of me would like a budget where I could just go out and buy whatever fabrics I wanted just for any given project or just because... but I have bought a lot of fabric in my past.

All of the on-line retailers have been hit pretty hard by both demand and supply issues with Covid. eQuilter currently has a couple of scrap packs available (have been sold out for awhile, usually there are more like 6-10 offerings). For the scrappy style I do, I find these to be a very good bargain in assortments of new fabric. There will be different themes/styles.
https://www.equilter.com/category/38...se-scrap-packs

I buy Dream Cotton by the bolt from Marshall's Dry Goods under $3 a yard. It's all solid colors. It's like Moda Bella solids and just like Moda it ravels some. Still excellent quality. I keep a bolt of white, muslin color, black and gray. I live close enough to go there so I have a bolt of every color bought over time.

I don’t. I won’t spend hours and hours of my time to make something with substandard shoddy fabric. I do check clearance items on quilt shop quality fabric, but it won’t be a couple of dollars. I also won’t buy cheap fabric I consider ugly to be able to crank out large volumes of ugly quilts, regardless of who they are destined for. Quality vs. quantity..

I can't find it that low, except sometimes at Marshall Dry Goods. I've been making many Modern quilts lately for a presentation I'm doing and solids are definitely cheaper! If you don't already include solids, that is a suggestion.

I should always mention in my getting things at thrift stores is that I am lucky to live in a rather affluent part of the country, the Seattle area. Not all thrift store shops are equal and the best stuff is typically in the higher priced zip codes. There is a surplus of high quality everything here. I don't buy every piece of fabric I come across, and those I buy are from known brand names. I'm often getting entire collections from someone who bought it new at the LQS and never used it and is now down-sizing or moving or getting out of the hobby. Last year for example, I bought a large bag of someone's batik souvenirs from a trip to Indonesia. Yards and yards of gorgeous high quality heavily gold embellished fabrics perfect for a OBW or many other things for $5.99. You are just not going to be able to find things like that often, even here, much less somewhere else.

There are several fabric stash sale sites on Facebook, where you can buy fabrics as cheap as $2-$3 a yard. Not everyone sells that cheap, but plenty do. Check out Sew Its For Sale, Fabric for Sale, Quilters Market, The Original Fabric Destash, and an auction is offered every weekend on Leesa's Fabrics.

Cheap does not always equal substandard or shoddy.
But, sometimes it does mean buying in bulk.
You can still get wholesale or warehouse prices.
As stated above, https://marshalldrygoods.com/ is a good place to visit.
One of my fave places to buy quality, name brand, modern quilting fabric is Textile Collections: https://fabric4less.com
the catch....you have to buy most fabrics by the bolt.
This place also has cork fabric (fat quarter size pieces-not by the bolt), polar fleece, flannel, home dec, and other fabrics, just like MDG
also, for just a bit more, https://www.quiltedtwins.com/ is a fun place.
and the hunt for clearance sales is always a fun challenge. :)

edit: oh, to see the prices at Textile Collections, you do have to register...create an account, but it's free.

There is a difference between cheap and inexpensive.