Many years ago, when my husband and I were having one of those what-if-we-won-the-lottery moments, we started talking about how we would spend the many millions of dollars that were sure to come our way if we would ever just buy a ticket. He had thoughts of travel, going around the world, and winding up in Antarctica for an extended stay. Not that I have anything against the cold, because that is when being a knitter gives you a marked advantage, but I am not sure I would like hanging out on a giant ice cube and waiting for it to be morning.
My dream, I said, would be to open a yarn shop. I would get to spend the day with all the stuff I like, I could have stitch markers whenever I needed them, and I could go to shows and see the new yarns before they were even out! Yeah, we told each other, someday we would get to travel around the world, and when we are finished I will open my shop and knit all day long. I imagined at the time that nothing could be better.
Fast forward a couple of years and one morning I was taking the hubs in for some medical testing. I was in an unfamiliar neighborhood and just happened to glance down a street and see a sign for a yarn shop that I didn’t even know about! About ten minutes from my house! This could not be. I waited with my husband through his procedure and when we got home I Googled the name of the shop and found….nothing.
That was weird, since I thought Google knew everything about everything. I went up a few days later to check out the shop and it seemed like a nice place, maybe a little pricey for my budget but still…it’s nice to have options. I spoke with the girl at the counter and she invited me to come on Wednesdays for their weekly gathering of knitters. I was just learning about Ravelry at the time and found the group, pulled together some courage, and dropped in.
I met the craziest group of women ever collected. We laughed, told stories and ribald jokes, encouraged each other, and so on. What a lot of fun this whole knit night was turning out to be! There was only one problem. The proprietress.
The owner of the shop was a just-a-lit-tle-bit of a pill. Not that this could discourage me from coming, since I enjoyed the company of the other knitters so much. However, I got tired of the shop owner complaining to us (a group of customers) about how “f*ckingshitty” her other customers were. We would make suggestions for the shop and she would get defensive . We suggested she should have test balls of yarn out for the customers to play with before buying a strange yarn, and she said “oh you would like that wouldn’t you, for me to just GIVE it away.”
We said she should carry Lorna’s Laces, and she did get a trial batch of it that sold out right away but never restocked it because she wanted people to buy up what was already in the store. We said she should get a full spectrum lamp because it was hard to compare colors in the overhead lighting and she went on a tirade about how there weren’t enough electrical outlets in the store. The suggestions went on, ie “You should have a website”, “You should go on Ravelry and promote the shop”, “You should advertise since most of us stumbled on the shop by accident,” “You should have a couple of sock models made up from this yarn so people can feel what it is like when it’s knitted.” Ah, she would get so mad at us.
About a year ago, I volunteered my husband to be her webmaster, because I thought it was just wrong for her to be running a business in 2009 that did not have a website. He talked with her a couple of times and got some vague ideas, put something together, and published it for her. For the past year he has maintained this website, gratis, with only my gratitude as his payment. Sadly, he just made the final update. The owner of the shop has announced its closing.
I can’t say we never saw it coming, because we did. In the past few months we have all commented on how the stock is not being replenished. Someone wanted to buy double pointed sock needles but found there was only one set in the store, take it or leave it. The proprietress would arrive a few minutes before closing and verbally fire off a stream of grievances (and shockingly, I heard her spout some racial epithets more than once). The knit night had a nominal fee for us to come and sit around the table and chatter…she said “I’m losing money on you b*tches.”
I hate to make her sound like such a terrible person, so I am only going to say this: if I ever do decide to open a yarn shop, I will have some good lessons under my belt already. Lessons like… respect your customers and don’t insult them the moment they walk out. Listen to your customers, find out what they want and try to provide it. Stay positive in the face of all adversity because people will remember how they are treated. Keep current with new publications, new color selections, new trends. Promote the shop in all kinds of venues – in the paper, on the web, on Ravelry, on bumper stickers. Most importantly, welcome new customers with openness and not suspicion (“Huh! That old broad just came in here to use my bathroom!”).
These are things I have learned from a year of watching someone else live my dream, and I hope I will be the wiser for it whenever my day comes. In the meantime I am going to hit the clearance sale like there is no tomorrow. Of course, since I will not go into business until after I have won the lottery, the odds are good it will never happen. But still, if one day you are out shopping and see a very eccentric yarn shop with only the owner sitting and contentedly knitting while surrounded by walls of wool…it will probably be me. Stop in and say hi, or just use the bathroom. I will try not to mind.
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