gale

Honestly I'd pay the full price for fabric at my LQS but they don't carry anything I like. I asked if they might ever get the brighter more modern lines and/or novelty prints like alexander henry, riley blake, etc or even lines like meadowsweet that are cute and bright yet still more traditional and she said no, so I don't even go anymore. I had planned to at least buy thread there but they never have it either.

Joan Rosemary

In england it is roughly 150% on most products but I am not sure on Fabrics.
Joan

crashnquilt

BellaBoo I can appreciate your thoughts but there is a tiny glitch. For a retailer, it is actually illegal to purchase retaii from one store and resell the item retail in another store. Unfortunate but true.

Regarding Marshall Dry Goods, I love that place, their fabric is factory close out fabric. Albeit, great quality fabrics but being factory close outs the store runs the risk of not being able to get the same fabric if a customer should need more.

I do agree, if the LQS would bring in some lower price fabrics they do have a much better chance of bringing in more customers.

It is a really bad catch 22 situation. People that follow the magazines really want the current fabric lines but if the store is mostly selling close outs then they get the reputation of "selling old fabric" and that rumor will kill a shop super fast.

hobo2000

I run a small shop, not quilts, and we use 50% markup but believe me that does not produce a living wage today. It did 4-5 years ago but with all of the added taxes, reports and such, it eats away our time and money. Inspector coming thru, I had to widen my paths, which are already wider than a quilt shops. There is always govt. after the small businessman or woman. At least my materials are steady, I don't have women clamboring for the latest fabric they saw in such & such magazine. I admire my LQS staff. It's not easy to keep supplying what women want and then what to do with what doesn't sell.

AbbyQuilts

Thats what we did was mostly 50% mark up and we worked hard but we had money we were not poor and the business was not suffering.
I think other then dog food 70% if our items were 50% mark up. 15% of the items 30-40% and the other 15% were more.

My husband said when I got into this (married into a business)
that all you need is 30% mark up 10% for overhead, 10% for growth and10% for your pocket.
I dont know if that is true and like I said most was 50% not 30

Maybe because we had grooming attached and although it had over head there was more profit from there. Maybe thats why we could not charge 100% mark up and still survive for years.

Plus as hobo2000 said above me. That was 5 years ago and a lot has change.

ckcowl

i worked for a time at a shop that simply priced everything at the suggested retail price indicated on her invoice,...most things that equalled a 100% mark up...her philosophy is...that is what i'm supposed to charge. period...she only has one sale a year...and never discounts anything. Our 'new' joannes i think marks theirs up 200% or more...their prices are totally outragious! when i can get the same fabric at the lqs for $7.95 a yard and joannes is 'trying' to sell it for $9.98??? i won't even go there any more...they have crappy fabric that if i were at walmart shopping and saw it for $2 a yard i might buy it, and here it is at joannes for $9 + a yard...
then we have another lqs that prices everything at $7.95 regardless of what they paid for it....so they are probably more in line with a 50-75% mark up. you can tell the places just in it for the $$ and the ones who are in it because they love it and want to share it with many.

raptureready

I've always assumed that it's marked up quite a bit---like 2-300% or 2 - 3 x what they pay for it. With the cost of insurance, water, lights, heat, air condintioning, rent or bldg payment, labor and maintenance and then needing room to still make a profit when it's marked down I just figured it would take that much to keep them in business. Perhaps not if they're a chain such as Joann's or Hancock's but a local, privately owned business would just about have too.

BellaBoo

The fabric/sewing shop here that closed due to owner retirement after 30 years, always sold clearance items from other stores. Their prices were not much over the clearance price. Everyone knew to go to the bargain bin section of the store. They never had a problem I guess because they did it right up to retirement. The store was the only fabric store in the surrounding towns. the good fabric at great prices always sold out first, no matter if it was last year's line or several years old. It's odd how one business can stay profitable for so long and others can't make a go of it. No other fabric store has lasted more then two years since the old one closed. :cry:

Quiltzilla

This is one of the reasons for pushing fabric out the door, by using closeout pricing, when it has been in the shop for nearly a year. Even though the shop makes no profit from the closeout sale, and is losing money on its balance sheet, it makes room on the shelf for the newest fabrics and it supplies money need to buy those new fabrics for the shop.

Selling 'perfectly good' fabric at closeout prices just because it's a year old seems crazy to me but, it's part of the quilt shop business. After all, if you look at a five year old quilt, can you tell which fabrics were new that year and which were not?

Lori S

I have the expectation that they will double what they paid for it.
I have the expectation that in turn I will be provided with quality goods, good service from a knowledgeable staff.