Thanks, Ginny...

debra roby — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 09:36:29 -0500

I'll admit I have a hooker much longer than a knitter. They both have their advantages.

Steph will be holding smaller "represent" parties all along her book tour, and there may be one nearer to you.

LOVE your gittle pattern! and your tag lineand your tag line!
In the battle of chores: yarn beats the dishes
Debra
A Stitch In Time
Deb's Daily Distractions

Way to represent!

ginnygrl — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 15:25:58 -0500

I have to admit to being a crocheter not a knitter - but I love this party. If I lived on the east coast, or had the fundage to go I would love to step out and represent on this day. Excellent idea.

The Yarn Harlot Plans "The Represent Tour"

debra roby — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 09:32:28 -0600

We know the old saw about NEVER ASSUME: It makes an ASS out of U and ME. It appears that too many businesses are making this mistake when they deal with crafters. Last month, it a bank that did not believe the numbers for sock club and cancel credit card businesses.

According to Steph, the Yarn Harlot, it regularly happens when she books a venue for her book tour. She will alert a store that 300 folks will be there; they scoff and put out 20 chairs. It happens when she people discount her success as an author because "she only writes knitting books" while she is outselling the "real authors" she's standing with.

There is this overwhelming tendency to discount the sheer numbers of folks who participate in a social/creative hobby and their potential positive or negative economic impact on a business if you don't assume incorrectly and discount them.

It happens over and over and over again, and it's starting to bug me. ... It's ok with me if we need to tell them what they need to know when they need to know it. ... It is that they cannot let go of their own ideas enough to cope.

It is that when we explain to them how many chairs/ bandwidth/ credit card transactions/ books/ yarn/ microphones/ beers we are going to need and they pat us on our pretty little heads and go get the number of chairs/ bandwidth/ credit card transactions/ books/ yarn/ microphones/ beers that they think we will need and leave us all standing around without all that stuff that I start getting snotty.

There are plenty of excuses for people not being prepared. No problem. We didn't warn you? Mea culpa. All is forgiven. How should you know.

There are no excuses for when we say "There are 300 knitters coming to your bookstore on Friday. " and they say "Sure...sure honey. Hundreds of knitters. Uh-huh. Why don't you go knit on your cute little sock over there while we PREPARE TO SCREW YOU OVER BECAUSE WE ARE SUFFERING FROM A TERMINAL STEREOTYPE."

Sorry.

Now Steph has a new book coming out March 22 that will combine travel and knitting and she has decided to use her book launch to make a point. Don't discount the numbers. She is proposing holding her book launch party in New York City at the The Fashion Institute of Technology, filling their 750 seat auditorium with knitters, posing knitters in Central Park with their traveling socks. Her devious plan:

There will be surprises, there will be fun stuff, there will be New York City FILTHY WITH KNITTERS that day. People will see us in coffee shops, on benches, at lunch joints, all converging on FIT. The muggles will look at each other and say "is it just me, or does there seem to be a crazy number of knitters around here today?"

From that day forward, every time somebody tries to tell a knitter that she doesn't represent a huge cash spending demographic that needs some damn chairs, she can point to this day. She can show them pictures, and instead of a pat on the head she can get a freakin' handshake and a business loan.

Ironically, Steph herself discounted the response to her initial call for action, but is now developing a plan: The Representing Tour! All aboard the bus!!

Debra Roby blogs her art at A Stitch in Time and her life at Deb's Daily Distractions .

BlogHer - The Yarn Harlot Plans "The Represent Tour" - Comments

Thanks, Ginny...

Way to represent!

The Yarn Harlot Plans "The Represent Tour"