Wednesday, April 23, 2008

We've launched!!!

The new website is LIVE! I think it looks fantastic, and sure hope that you do too. There's still a ton of work to do on it, but it's got a lot more stuff on it, and more information and photos will be added daily. It's been a long road to get here, but I think you'll agree it was all worth it. Everything in all our catalogs, and all the stuff that didn't even make the catalogs is on the site now.

Go check out the beautiful Mickey Mouse daffodils on the front page, proudly posing with handknit socks. The daffodils are in Karen's back yard. We had fun going around Carlton looking for likely photo opportunities for our socks.

More to come!

Diane

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Weighty matters

We're coming down to the wire! We're set to launch our brand new website (same address - www.woolworks.com) in under 2 weeks (gasp!) and we're feverishly trying to get as much done as possible. Getting everything done is not possible, of course. I think the nature of a website is to be "under construction", because as everyone knows - things change. New items are brought in, things get discontinued, things change price, more information becomes available....

With our new website launch, we're going to do delivery charges a little differently. We want to do ACTUAL shipping charges. That means that we need to know what everything weighs.
E v e r y t h i n g .... There are approximately 16,000 individual items in inventory. Well - should say SKUs, because some SKUs have multiples in inventory (10 balls of yarn X, color Y). So we're weighing things and entering them. We're getting images of them. We're writing up descriptions of them. It's a rather big job. Back to the shipping charges - you'll get the opportunity to see what it would cost to send your package via Priority mail, or UPS, and decide which way works best for you. It will be based on the weight of the things you order, rather than some other seemingly random method of assigning a delivery charge. If you buy a lightweight but expensive item, it won't cost as much to ship as it would a heavy cheap item. We're hoping that people will like this. I wish we could send stuff for free, but it does cost money to ship stuff, plain and simple. We will continue to offer the free shipping for orders over $300 (except floor looms, which are sent by freight company..... fuel surcharges have tripled in the last 6 months...)

AND we just finished up the spring knit catalog. It is at the printer, hurray!! Typically it's about 2 weeks from printer to mailbox, so look for it soon! Right about the same time the new website launches! egads.

AND I somehow got talked into being the vendor coordinator for Black Sheep Gathering (it seemed like a good idea at the time - I mean, I DO want to give back to the Black Sheep community!) and I'm trying to get all that stuff worked out and sent out and managed.

So if the blog seems a little neglected, maybe you'll understand.

Oh, and I have a mare due to foal in the next couple weeks...

Timing is everything! :)

Happy spring!

Diane