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Sewing, blogging, and creative business.

Sewing and Creative Business News from Around the Web This Week

this week

Lots going on in the world of sewing and creative business this week.

1. Stitch magazine emailed contributors this week to announce that it’s folding. Artists and Makers, another F+W magazine, will also cease publication. Print publishing in craft and how-to is in upheaval for sure, although Missouri Star Quilt Company’s print magazine, Block, seems to be taking off. It’s ad free and chock full of projects. Apparently people take each issue to the copy shop to have them spiral bound. Christine Ricks is the creative director. When quilt shops are closing, Missouri Star is expanding. When print magazines are folding, Missouri Star starts one of their own. It’s a phenomenon.

2. Threadbias will be closing at the end of the month. Owners Alex and Rebecca Peachey and Amanda Clow explained, “Roughly 50 people regularly post and comment on projects and participate in the forums. At the same time, the cost to keep the Community running has taken quite a toll financially.” I wrote about Threadbias two summers ago in a post about why there isn’t a sewing site like Ravelry. They were unhappy with my post and, with their permission, I published their response here. Their online quilting software will remain as a separate site.

3. Spoonflower’s co-founder Stephen Fraser announced on Wednesday that the company has received $25 million in venture capital. It will expand its current site in Durham, North Carolina and open an international office in Germany. (Listen to my podcast interview with Stephen. He’s pretty great.)

4. Three Bird Nest owner Alicia Schaffer announced yesterday that she’s leaving Etsy. In February Alicia became a news media darling when her story of earning $960,000 a year selling hand-knit leg warmers on the site coincided with the Etsy IPO. My piece exposing the real story behind Three Bird Nest continues to be the most clicked on blog post I’ve ever written. Through it all, Etsy remained silent. Now, at last, they’ve released an official statement to Yahoo Makers:

At Etsy, we work with our sellers to help them grow their businesses and uphold our policies, which are vital to the integrity of our marketplace. If an Etsy seller still cannot live up to her responsibilities, provide the level of customer service our buyers expect or comply with our handmade policy, we may take appropriate action. While we generally don’t comment on specific sellers, Three Bird Nest was unable to demonstrate sufficient compliance with our policies.

Have no fear, though. This shop sells the same imported merchandise and even has a blond-wigged model in the same pose!

5. And just to leave you with something happy that will restore your love of the craft, watch Knit Me Some Happiness. It’ll make you smile.

Comments

  4. Susan says

    Stitch magazine’s website had the most recent blog post from 2011 and a 2010 issue of Stitch on the site homepage…that should tell you something.

  5. Snow says

    I wonder if part of the problem with Stitch was its publisher Interweave. Even before F&W bought Interweave, their customer service has been lacking. For many of their magazines, they don’t offer subscriptions and when I asked in the past about subscriptions to first Interweave Crochet and later Stitch, they acted like I was asking for something outrageous. Some of their magazines now have traditional subscriptions, but Modern Patchwork still doesn’t. You have to use their “auto-ship” program, but when I tried to set that up, I had the worst time getting anyone in customer service to respond to my emails. Even after I gave in and called, there were still problems. I’m not sure why the basics of magazine subscriptions are so confusing to people who are publishing magazines!

    (Full disclosure: I am the author of a now out-of-print book published by Krause, which is also a subsidiary of F&W.)

  6. Melissa Gilmore says

    I hand make all of the items at bohofashionshop on etsy as I do at enchantedground on etsy, cookiescostumes on etsy and scraptacularscraps on etsy and my other two sites, ebay store and website pasties.net. The blonde “model” is me and I’m 54 years old so as I appreciate being mistaken for a model I do not appreciate you implying my items are not hand made. Yes, I am attempting to offer the kinds of items that threebirdnest and graceandlaceco sold because they were very successful.