Price Increase set for March 1st

Must say that I am impressed by the level of understanding reflected in customer letters about the upcoming price increase. It is the first time people have written insightful letters to me about the world economy, and how it relates to our small fiber businesses.

Now, the price's are only going up on the merino yarns and blends of cashmere, silk, nylon, alpaca, tencel, bamboo. Not on the BFL yarns.

The Bluefaced Leicester yarns are set, pricewise, for the next year. We have recently held a 10% discount sale on the new superwash BFL's and quite of few of our customers took us up on the opportunity to get to know these new yarns. The new yarns were developed in after the fire at the BFL warehouse in the U.K., back in October. That fire destroyed the entire stock of two of Wool2Dye4's BFL yarns, BFL Ultra! and BFL Aran (non-superwash). This, in addition to three tons of lovely BFL yarns which were the stock of my U.K. supplier. When he began to restock, he decided to revamp the BFL line and to respond to current trends in the market. So, we have a high twist sock weight (think of Sheila's Gold interpreted in Bluefaced Leicester), BFL Silky Lace, and a BFL/silk sock weight in addition to the DK and Aran weights in superwash.

Restocking!

It's that time again, and we are just about ready to accept another shipment of spring yarns. Here is what is expected on Friday (skeins, unless noted):

- Angel Delight Fingering
- Angel Sport Sock
- Butterfly Select
- Cash Aran MCN (limited quantity)
- Cash Aran MCN (cones)
- Cash Sock MCN
- Sheila's Aran
- Sheila's Sock
- Silk Sock 50/50
- W2D4 Merino Worsted
- W2D4 Merino Worsted-SW
- W2D4 Merino DK-SW

Lots of interest lately in the sparkly yarns! Our silvertoned Stellina yarn, Sheila's Sparkle, will return to stock in two weeks. And, we introduce the goldtone version, Sheila's Glitter, at the end of this week! It is priced just as Sparkle, and we have a good quantity of it in stock right now, enough to go around.

As promised, the price increase will go into effect on March 1, 2011. We will be ready to send printable pricelist revisions next week.

One of my assistants, Sarah, has cut her hours recently as she prepares to go to pharmacy school in the fall. She has been working so hard to get some required courses under her belt, and this semester, unfortunately, has had to pare down her time at Wool2Dye4 to Thursdays and Fridays. Sarah is mistress and guru of all things 'Excel' around here, so that's why the delay in producing a printable new pricelist.

I suppose I will have to get serious and learn about Excel! There is actually a four hour short course in April on mastering the most common formulae. That is the class for me. This date is definitely on the calendar.

We will be making an announcement about a charity project that we've been working on, and we'll start to talk about this sometime next month. The background is that Wool2Dye4 has been looking for an opportunity to particpate in a charity on multiple layers of involvement, a program which we can continue to support as we go forward. So, we have come up with a unique yarn which we will have dyed and which will present opportunities for our customers and for us to give back. Yes! Color at Wool2Dye4. Just one yarn, though, will be produced so we had to look very hard to find just the right color. Here is the address of the one color we have chosen have dyed and which we will carry on the website ... http://www.pantone.com/pages/Pantone/Pantone.aspx?pg=20821&ca=1

It is Pantone's Color of the Year 2011. More about our project next month. But, take a look at the color and ready the description about courage and strength. Just the sort of words we would choose for our charity, ourselves!

New yarns just arrived...

Over the past year, I got away from posting the contents of new stock shipments, and was sending a newsletter to a Wholesale mailing list and a separate Retail list. The program, though, has become less and less reliable as my list has grown, and only rarely allows me in. So, today I am back to posting the list of incoming stock on the blog.

Here is what arrived today:
Sheila's Gold ... Sheila's Sock ... Cash Sock ... Platinum Sock ... W2D4 Merino DK-SW ... W2D4 Merino Worsted-SW.
We have some customers who took up my suggestion, put forth on Ravelry.com, to eMail me and ask for some yarns to be reserved. Some of these invoices have already been created and sent to the customers with pre-reserved yarns, and the rest will go out by the end of the business day.

I will have all the private invoices posted on the website. If you have reserved yarns, you may pick up your private listing under the category Odds'n'Ends. I will send you a copy of the private listing in a confirming eMail and that's how you know that the invoice is posted on the site. Just choose it as you would any other item on the websie, and the program will figure the weight and postage for us.