Customer Commissions

On occasion I will knit for a customer. The money is really not worth it, for the time spent knitting. There is no real way to charge per hour of knitting, as no one would ever pay for the time in an amount that would be worth it. I do it when I have the time, and when it’s a project that I actually want to knit. Above, a customer came in with a kit that she had purchased at my shop, however she was allergic to one of the contents of the fibre, and wanted to finish the hat for her 9 year old grandchild. This hat (on larger needles and with chunky wool) didn’t take me long to knit at all. It was a sirdar kit that we had in the shop maybe a year or two ago. She needed it before Christmas and I was able to get it done for her, in between working on othe projects. The hat below, was another story. A British gentleman convinced me to knit him a hat – I think it was the accent that got to me! He wanted only me to knit it, not any of my knitters that sometimes knit for my customers. The only problem was, he wanted it in fingering weight yarn, and because I had knit the Habs hat like this, in less than 24 hours for the shop, I agreed. However, he then came back to me, and asked me to knit him it the same like the shop one, however, the slouch version, not the beanie version. Which is knit to 11” instead of 6.5” before you begin the crown shaping. An extra 4.5” in stockinette stitch with fingering weight yarn on 3.75mm needles. This hat, by the time I was done, I didn’t want to know of it anymore. The hat took me about 5 days to complete. My customer loved it – and even called me the next day to talk about a matching scarf. And about two weeks later he came back to me about a cowl. I told him that I probably could get one of my knitters to knit him a scarf or cowl, but right now I’ve got too much going on and won’t be able to knit for him. We’ll see if he comes back to me or not for one of my knitters to knit it for him. I think it’ll be a while before I knit for customers again. I don’t like the pressure and I just don’t have the time right now.