How Colleen Granger Built Her Longarm Quilting Business Across States

0:00 Hello everybody and welcome to another edition of Quilting Business Success.

0:29 We are we're gonna wait just a few seconds while people log on and join in

0:38 to be with us. They're coming in we're 12, 13, 14 yep coming in. So Bobby and I are

0:47 in a location we've not been in before. We're in a hidden underground bunker.

0:52 We're in an undisclosed location in southern Missouri. Yes we're borrowing a

0:58 theater actually and and on the other side of the screen where you guys can't

1:04 see it it's the theater screen and we could be here watching a movie but

1:08 instead we're here with you guys and with Colleen. We have Colleen Granger

1:13 with us today and we we've gotten to know Colleen really really well over the

1:21 over the last little bit of time and we're looking forward to talking with

1:27 her. Are we gonna wait a little while we're gonna just dive right into this

1:32 thing. I think we've got enough people that have come in they'll catch up

1:36 otherwise and they can always listen to the recording. Just real quick if anybody

1:40 ever wants to subscribe to all and listen to we've got currently over 50

1:47 recordings of well no not 50 recordings but we've got over 50 quilters that have

1:54 told their story. A lot of the earlier episodes we had two interviews back-to-

1:59 back which I like that a lot but it also ends up with one person kind of sitting

2:04 there the whole time waiting while somebody tells their story before they

2:08 can tell theirs. So I don't know it's fine either way as far as I'm concerned

2:12 but we've got over 50 of those and you can go to YouTube and then you can

2:17 search just on the on the name which is quilting business success. You can also

2:22 go to gamble.com and we have a page and I just think it's probably gamble.com

2:28 slash quilting business success but it might be a little bit different it might

2:32 have hyphens in it or or something I'm not exactly sure but on that page you

2:38 can get the recordings audio or video or you can if you have a podcast app on

2:46 your phone or other device you can search for the name quilting business

2:50 success and as we're going today if you have a question for us or for Colleen

2:55 there is if you're one of the live participants right now down at the

3:00 bottom of your screen there's a I believe it's called Q&A. Yeah if you have

3:07 a question that you'd like to ask of Colleen during the interview this is for

3:12 the people who are watching live right now you can type in your question and if

3:18 we are paying attention which we usually are but sometimes we're not we will see

3:24 those questions and we'll we'll ask Colleen. Yeah we'll read it live. Okay so

3:29 let's get started jump right in and Colleen is here to tell us about her

3:34 story how she how she has grown her quilting business so hello and what where

3:44 is home for you where do you live? Today my home is in Vallejo California. Vallejo

3:51 today? Is this a recent development that just occurred today? No it occurred two

3:58 years ago but I was in Marin County before that and Alaska before that. So

4:04 does that mean that every time you've moved that you kind of carried some of

4:09 your clients with you but then had to find a bunch of new ones or? A lot of a

4:16 lot of my customers follow me. I did when I first moved from Alaska down to

4:22 California and they would mail all their quilts to me but I've had customers that

4:28 I've never met face-to-face. When I was in Alaska I would have people UPS or

4:35 mail me quilts and I would quilt them pack them all back up and I UPS would

4:42 come and I'd ship them back to wherever they were from and I've never they could

4:47 walk up to me tomorrow and I wouldn't know who they were. You wouldn't recognize them? Nope. I might recognize their quilt. From the very beginning you've had some customers that were

4:58 strictly mailing? Right. Okay. And I've been very very fortunate that, knock on

5:08 wood, I have not lost a quilt and no customer had lost a quilt in the mail

5:13 but I usually ship UPS so I have a more definite tracking number. Yeah very

5:20 careful about that. So Colleen how long have you been a longarm quilting? How

5:27 long you been doing this? 25 years. 25 years? I got my quilting machine in 1999.

5:35 And what made you decide to buy a quilting machine? Well I'm a little OCD

5:45 and it was going to take at least six months to get my quilt back from a

5:49 quilter if I sent it to her and so I had my very own machine and less time than

5:55 that and started my own business. So you basically started a business so that you

6:02 wouldn't have to wait for another quilter to finish your quilt. I lived in

6:09 a small town in Alaska and we were on the road system and when people found

6:16 out that I was going to buy a quilting machine or had bought one, quilts started

6:21 stacking up before the machine arrived because I ordered you know back then

6:27 which was not you guys, it was the actual Mr. Gamble and his family. Back then you

6:35 paid for your machine in full before they started making it. There was no

6:41 financing, there was no time to pay it off so I took a loan on my 401k, sent it

6:50 cashier's check to Gamble in February and on April 30th I got my machine in two

6:58 great big huge boxes and when I ordered my machine. Crates, yes and so when I

7:10 ordered my machine they said so what size table do you want and I said I

7:16 don't know what's the difference in shipping because when you live in Alaska

7:22 that's usually the first question you ask is how much is it going to cost to

7:25 ship it and the guy goes lady I'm charging you a thousand dollars no

7:30 matter what size table you got and I went oh okay bigger is better so send me

7:35 a 14 footer so then I measured my house and so I I conned my girlfriend who had

7:47 the local quilt shop into setting up my machine in her shop. So it wouldn't fit

7:54 in your house? No well it would have but my husband would have had to give up his

7:59 recliner and his TV so no it wouldn't have fit in my house. It would have stirred up some

8:05 problems yeah. Yeah yeah true so it went to the quilt shop. Your girlfriend's

8:12 quilt shop. Yep. Which may have been an excellent fortuitous situation we'll see.

8:18 It it works very well for both parties as a general rule. It's amazing how many

8:26 people if the machine is operating because back then it was all manual I

8:32 mean I there was no stitch regulation or anything it was all constant speed but

8:39 people would walk in and start talking to me and and and I don't mean to be

8:44 rude but men especially would grab the machine and it would be like oh don't do

8:51 that but but they were fascinated you know it was it was an anomaly and most

8:57 people had never seen I mean I had never seen one I saw a picture on the internet

9:01 when I bought it. Well that's what I was wondering you know you bought the

9:06 machine obviously sight unseen and ordered it were there a lot of

9:11 different ones that you considered at the time and then you decided to get the

9:15 How did you pick this one? There were I think at the time there was like four or

9:25 five different quilting machines there's there were more there are more now than

9:31 what there were and of course some of them have gone away but like there was

9:37 there were two different manufacturers that had oil wells that were open oil

9:44 wells that your machine sat in and as I told you earlier before we started this

9:50 you know I was a mechanic in the Air Force and and and there was just

9:54 something about fabric and oil in close proximity that it just didn't make sense

10:02 to me and I mean well I know the machines got oil in it because I oil it

10:08 every day you know because I use it every day but it was just the fact that

10:14 it would have a yeah I was gonna say a puddle but yeah they would have this

10:21 reservoir that the machine sat in and you know so so those kind of went to the

10:27 wayside and and then looking at it it just seemed like the the gamble was had

10:33 been tried and true and it just seemed like it was a more substantial piece of

10:38 equipment and I know before I upgraded in 2017 I looked at machines all over

10:47 again and because I could either upgrade my machine to a Statler or I could buy a

10:54 new machine and you know I just I really like the Statler I like the feel of it I

11:02 like the way it operated of course I did have 18 years at that time you know

11:08 operating it but they just let me let me review that what we've been through

11:14 so far here you ordered a machine and a 14-foot table sight unseen and you

11:24 weren't sure that it was going to fit in your house at the time and it didn't yeah

11:28 well you know indoctrination by fire and that's my life and and you the reason

11:35 you bought it was you decide to go ahead and start a business because you

11:40 had tried to get a quilt done by somebody and didn't like the turnaround

11:45 time was that what it was it was going to take six months well if that lady was

11:50 going to take six months that is a clue that there's that if you couldn't get

11:55 your quilt done nobody else could either and so that meant there was lots of

12:00 available business for you to do quilting is that well in that same

12:04 little town okay so there were like 500 people in a 50 mile radius Alaska right

12:11 yeah this is in Alaska there there are there are three machines in that town

12:18 now yeah when I had when I brought mine and mine was the only one what and that

12:26 closest one was 120 miles away in Valdez yeah there's a lot of quilts that need

12:31 to be quilted and those ladies are making lots of quilts and there's lots

12:38 of different ways to quilt you know I starting in Alaska I very utilitarian

12:45 and and so I don't do what do you call it heirloom quilting I mean that's just

12:53 that's not my stick I do I do I still do a lot of free hand I do custom

13:02 quilting so you know you sometimes might do half a dozen designs on one quilt and

13:08 there's a lot of people that are just like I just want it the cheapest way

13:13 possible although I can custom you know I can custom quilt sometimes faster than

13:19 I can get the computer to do it but you know that's just because of the

13:24 programming and and so I do all I do it all but I don't do heirloom I don't do

13:32 all that straight lines okay and so you started out you you felt pretty

13:41 confident when you first started out that you would have enough customers to

13:46 run a business or was that I worked full-time I was a I was the PR person

13:54 for the electric company you were thinking well I'll do some quilts for

14:00 other people who will pay me to do it and that'll pay for the cost of my

14:03 machine I paid for my machine in less than three years yeah okay and and that

14:09 was working like two hours a night and either Saturday or Sunday because there

14:15 is hunting season and fishing season in Alaska so you know you have to which I

14:19 imagine is a pretty big deal in Alaska yeah and you said you you had come up

14:24 with the funds to buy the machine by borrowing from your 401k that's a pretty

14:29 common way that people will do it right is that something that looking back on

14:35 it that that was a good choice for me it was but there I mean you know now you

14:41 can go and buy a gamble and you can get financing and back then they did not

14:46 offer any financing right right and so it was with what I was making percentage

14:53 wise on my 401k investment as opposed to what I'd be paying for a loan at the

14:58 bank it was cheaper to get it from my 401k yeah yeah that makes a lot of sense

15:04 so have you you mentioned three different locations have you moved the

15:10 same machine with you when you moved yes and I've done myself today for me

15:16 yeah yeah I still have my same machine it has a it went from you know hand

15:24 guided to Statler and so then actually had a stitch regulator which really took

15:30 me a long time to get used to because I I moved faster than the stitch

15:35 regulator wanted me to move right you got accustomed to the old old-fashioned

15:40 way yeah yeah true and and so I went up to the gamble dealer and I said can you

15:48 speed this thing up you know it's and they're like oh we've never seen anybody

15:53 operate this machine this fast so but it was just because I had been doing it for

15:58 years yeah so but then I went from a Statler and now I have an Ascend and at

16:07 this point if you had to guess how many hours a week do you spend doing quilting

16:13 you said that while you're paying off your machine you were doing about two

16:18 hours a night and then some time on the weekends now are you quilting I quilt

16:24 probably I quit prop about 30 hours a week uh-huh sometimes more yeah you know

16:33 depending on time how long does it take you to get it put back to a customer my

16:40 quick customers not six months some of them are spoiled you know sometimes it

16:46 takes two weeks and some some people I'm their storage area and they say oh you

16:52 know if I see this by April I'll be really happy and I go oh okay and I write

16:58 that down on my log as to when they need their quilts and I try and accommodate

17:02 them as best I can based on the individual right so but usually it's

17:07 like less than 30 days that I have a quilt that's good people have told us

17:13 before that they can start to feel a little bit anxious if they have too many

17:17 quilts that they are caretaking you know they like to get in and out so I do yeah

17:25 so when did you have the when was did you first convert your machine to a

17:30 settler I got my statler in 2017 so the machine was 18 years old and what was

17:40 the what was the incentive and the reason to decide to do that because I

17:47 teach and I travel and I design quilts and I write books and so if I have my

17:54 cutting table and my computer on one table and I turn around and my quilting

18:01 machine is right behind me then I can cut out kits I could finish writing

18:09 patterns I can print them I could fold them and stuff them into those cute

18:14 little envelopes so that I could go out and teach while the machines still

18:18 running well that was the multi-tasker right yeah I'm a I'm a business of one

18:25 right so so do you do how much edge-to-edge you do versus custom is

18:34 it like half and a half or I would say probably there's probably about 65 to

18:42 70 percent of my is edge-to-edge and then and then the rest would be custom

18:49 work mm-hmm you know because we have a lot of art quilters in this area and so

18:58 they would prefer to have custom work done so that there's this unique it's

19:03 not something that you would see every day and how have you structured your

19:08 your rates on the edge-to-edge versus the the you know that the the hand

19:17 how do you how do you charge for the will I charge for edge-to-edge I charge

19:24 two and a half cents a square inch which runs about 50 bucks an hour I mean

19:29 that's kind of the way it works out and if it's custom then it's usually closer

19:37 to five cents a square inch and your ability to do free motion and guided

19:49 custom along with Statler work on a quilt is not that common a lot of the

19:55 people that do custom quilting on a Statler

20:00 using the computer for all of the custom work and so I bet I would imagine that

20:08 your clients are real pleased with what they get back because it is going to be

20:12 a little bit unique to their quilt so yeah yeah we collaborate a lot you know

20:21 with the the people that want custom work and a lot of them will come with a

20:28 preconceived notion of what they want because it is an art quilt and so they

20:35 want you know a giant swirl or overlapping circles or triangles or

20:41 what-have-you so there's a lot of drawing and it's fun because what you're

20:47 doing is you're doodling with a machine and so you're doodling with thread it's

20:52 a guess. They're paying you to play. Don't tell them that. Well we're talking to

20:59 longarm quilters we're talking to people who want to do what you're doing we're

21:03 not telling your customers that. Yeah I used to teach machine quilting on

21:09 domestic machines and I had a young lady in the back of the room one time and she

21:15 was an artist which I didn't know and so here's everybody else and I'm teaching

21:21 them how to do hearts and leaves and all this free motion stuff with their

21:25 domestic machine. She's in the back of the room and she's doing a circus

21:29 elephant and it's got a rug on its back and it's got a hat on and

21:37 and I'm like where did this come from she said oh I was just doodling you said it

21:43 was okay to play so you know people find that they can really do an awful lot and

21:50 I said oh you need to come to my house and play on the big machine. Yes yes. But

21:56 my grandson loves it. He'll come play on the machine. He's quilted his own quilts.

22:02 You know I I wanted to ask you what are the different things that you've done

22:08 over the years to to find new customers because you you've done it three times

22:15 at least. There's a lot of times that we'll interview folks and they'll tell

22:19 us how they got their customers and basically it was an activity that they

22:24 did for six months or two years to basically build a book of business and

22:28 then at that point they had their customer base and they would just ride

22:32 that out to retirement but your story is a little bit different. Tell us about the

22:37 different things that you've done to find customers and bring them in. Well

22:43 most I have tried advertising has brought me zero customers. Paid

22:49 advertising has got me absolutely nothing but what I did when I moved to

22:56 California because I disassembled my machine I loaded it into a 20-foot

23:02 trailer and I hauled it down the Alcan behind my expedition and built it up

23:09 again in my mother's garage and and so then I joined a couple of the local

23:15 quilt kilts and they started talking and you bring your quilts in they always do

23:21 show and share so you bring in your quilts so they can see what you've done

23:26 with your own stuff and then they're like whoa cool can you do that for me

23:31 it's like of course I can here's my card you know but and word-of-mouth has has

23:38 always worked for me it did in Marin County and it has in Vallejo and it's

23:45 been really good I mean even in Alaska I quilted for one lady who happened to be

23:51 driving through town and found the machine in a quilt shop and she worked

23:58 for Alaska Airlines and I had ten people from Alaska Airlines that sent me quilts

24:03 that again I had never seen their face. She told her co-workers. Yes.

24:09 That's a commonality that we always see with people that word-of-mouth is

24:15 generally the biggest influence and so for the people that are watching how how

24:23 important would you say it is to get out there and talk to people and communicate?

24:29 Oh it's vital I mean people people need to know who you are people need to know

24:35 that you're approachable there are there are some people I am surprised I went to

24:41 a long arm meeting when I first got to California there were 50 people in the

24:46 room they all owned a variety of different long arms one one woman had a

24:51 Statler had it for five years and she had never used it never turned it on

24:57 because she was afraid you know this quilt isn't good enough oh this quilt

25:02 is too good or this is this and it's like bite the bullet you know take the

25:07 plunge there's a lot of people that have come to me and wanted to rent my machine

25:12 and I I don't do that that makes me a little uncomfortable because if they do

25:18 something to the machine and it breaks then I'm out of commission for my other

25:23 customers but there are some there are some there used to be a store not too

25:29 far from here that would let people rent their machine you know so if you have

25:35 that opportunity go and do that it's not going to a show and trying it out for

25:42 five minutes at a show. Yeah that won't tell you anything. Well you get to see you know what it

25:51 will do I have never had a hard sell gamble dealer that I've seen in the

26:00 shows and and I've met a lot of them at the shows because I used to do quilt

26:04 market too and you know but you know somebody who's really pushing you to buy

26:10 something yeah back away do your homework do some research but find

26:16 people who are using those machines and see what difficulties they've had I mean

26:20 I have to tell you don't let make Bobby plug his ears for a minute but he's

26:26 great he talks to you he makes you feel like you're important he makes you feel

26:31 like you know what the heck you're talking about you know or don't know

26:35 what I'm talking about but it's he's been very very helpful to me and I've

26:41 talked to several other of your technicians and they've been great you

26:45 know all you know is that you can pick up the phone and and you can talk to

26:49 somebody thank you very much we work we work hard and Bobby I'll take the

26:55 inflation out of your head later no honestly we our whole goal here is that

27:03 we want to make the the experience of people who have their Statler's or even

27:10 their hand guiding machines the most positive experience they can and enable

27:15 them to to have a to be successful in their quilting and that's why we're

27:21 here and you know let me interject here that we we've experienced we get to see

27:30 a lot of people I've been in thousands of people's homes Bobby stuck the

27:34 thousands of people on the phone and one thing that is a common thread is that

27:42 these machines and the lifestyle of owning the machine and operating the

27:47 machine ends up being a life changer for people in a lot of different ways

27:52 obviously your life has gone completely different than it would have if you had

27:57 not ordered this machine oh yeah long ago and when we look and we see the the

28:06 change in people's lives and the freedom a lot of times that they get from being

28:11 able to be self-employed and control their own schedule and that sort of

28:15 thing you know sometimes our day at work is rough you know and we're like why am

28:20 I doing this and then we we meet somebody again who reminds us oh yeah

28:25 that's that's what we're doing is we're making it we're making people's lives

28:30 better so anyway we we love what we do but I wanted to ask you how many years

28:39 have you been running your business from when you got your machine at first

28:44 and currently at that time you had a regular eight to five office type job it

28:49 sounds like how many years did you did you work your full-time job before you

28:57 retired from that and it sounds like you did just long-arm quilting 30 hours a

29:01 week is pretty much full-time and teaching and your other stuff so how

29:05 many years I only did that well because it was a life change my my mother had a

29:13 stroke so I came that's why I came to California and so I brought my machine

29:18 with me because I had no idea how long I was going to stay and then

29:22 unfortunately my husband passed away and so I stayed a lot longer than I had

29:26 planned but you know that the nice thing about being self-employed is you

29:35 know what what my grandson has a hockey game I can take a week off and I can fly

29:41 to Alaska and I can go watch a hockey game you know and quilting people the

29:48 your customers that you have most of them are so understanding you say you

29:54 know what this is what's happening in my life and can you wait an extra week

29:59 and they're like oh yeah great time you know which is really really nice so

30:04 you're you're really flexible you know you can you can work you know if you if

30:09 you get itch to get things done you could work till 11 o'clock at night if

30:14 you want and then the next day you can go and play someplace else which is

30:19 really nice. Kelly, when you when you first moved down to California did were

30:25 you able to have the machine in your your house at that time? Yes, well I

30:30 moved into my mother's house and it moved into my mother's garage. Gotcha, and

30:36 you know I appreciate you sharing your story with us you know about your mother

30:41 and your husband I know the people watching there's so many people that can

30:46 relate to that because you know we're all gonna have tragedies and sometimes

30:52 bad tragedies that we go through in our life but the situation that you had you

30:58 had already built the business and you you had the means to you know to go

31:05 ahead and do this and work from home and how much would you say that it means to

31:13 be able to have that flexibility that you have had during all this stuff that

31:18 you've been through? For me it's it's just been wonderful I you know it is

31:25 kind of funny when I when I bought my house two years ago the realtor kept

31:29 saying why are you measuring all these rooms and I said well I have this 14

31:36 foot quilting table and it's got to fit so that that makes things a little bit

31:42 challenging but the nice thing is is that there are quilters all across the

31:49 country everybody is looking for something new and it's a it's a kind of

31:56 business that you can actually do anywhere that you end up I mean there

32:02 are your guys are having a conference in Hawaii this summer no I went to Reno

32:12 here I'll give you a sales pitch I'll give everybody a sales pitch if you're

32:17 thinking about buying a gamble go to quilting with confidence find one that's

32:22 in a local an area that's close to you and spend the money and go you can take

32:29 the free hand you know the hand guided machines or you can take the Ascend

32:34 version or the Statler version and you can learn more than you would possibly

32:40 ever learn sitting in front of a YouTube video. Yeah and without us without us

32:46 giving any advertisement for quilting with confidence yeah yeah what exactly

32:52 did was the benefit for you of going to quilting with confidence what what why

32:58 would you suggest that to people? Well I had already ordered my Ascend but it

33:05 hadn't come yet when I when I went to Reno and and you know like I said I've

33:13 I've been quilting for with the same machine for 25 years and so a friend of

33:18 mine who doesn't live too far away wanted me to go with her and I'm like

33:22 really what are they going to teach me but because I had ordered the Ascend we

33:27 took that course and the nice part was is they explained everything that was

33:34 going on the handbooks were fabulous I refer to them probably once a week

33:41 since I've taken that last year because it it is a great reference and it tells

33:48 you step-by-step which to what to do and how to do it but yeah you can always go

33:52 to YouTube but I'm old so I prefer paper but it it gives you a better insight the

34:01 technician Dwayne was fabulous because I was having you know as you know Bobby I

34:09 was having issues at that time and and I said you know this is what's happening

34:14 does this make any sense to you and and he stopped what he was doing he took the

34:18 time everybody that was there from Gammill took time to answer people's

34:24 questions to make sure everybody was comfortable and and then you had I

34:29 forget how many people were even there there was a lot but you had other people

34:35 that you could talk to and you could network with and pass your business card

34:39 around so you you had a resource that you could talk to that may be

34:44 experiencing the same thing that you are experienced and we're not working for

34:49 Gammill and let me say one thing you know I know we do have new owner training

35:00 that's available on Gammill.com is there's courses video courses that you can

35:06 purchase that are a exhaustive tons of videos that are really a great resource

35:10 but there's something about going to quilting with confidence that really

35:16 there's a spark to that getting together with other quilters. Do you have

35:21 anything to say about quilting with confidence? Well I would just say that

35:24 sometimes people who don't own a machine and they're not in the world that we're

35:30 in on the inside they aren't exactly sure what is it about having a

35:37 Gammill or a Statler that's so special they'll be like well I understand the

35:42 machine is the best machine and I understand that the software is the best

35:46 software but it sure is you know awfully expensive and I've looked at all these

35:51 other ones and what they're missing is they don't know any of the Gammill people

35:55 yet. When you get to go quilting with confidence and you get to know some of

36:01 the people that are behind the machine the people behind the education and the

36:07 heart of the people that and people like yourself who are part of this

36:12 community then you start to see the whole picture and so I think coming with

36:17 quilting with confidence is certainly an opportunity to to get a glimpse into

36:23 that. I appreciate you saying that about we these are I mean they're going on I

36:28 mean it's basically two of them a week. I was I was shocked to hear how far they

36:35 were traveling each night in that truck you know when the session was over and

36:40 then but they were leaving Reno going to I think they were going to Arizona next

36:45 or something and I went oh my gosh and and when when it was time to load that

36:52 truck I stood there in awe watching them it's like a giant jigsaw puzzle.

36:58 Yes yeah but and and it was all teamwork and I think I think the other thing is

37:05 is that nobody is high and mighty everybody that was there was John Q

37:15 public you know was just we're just all the same it all depends on what our

37:21 experiences are and everybody is willing to share their experiences which is it

37:27 doesn't take long to realize that each and every one of them is a pretty

37:31 special superstar in their own right but that they but they don't wear that that's

37:39 not who they are. They're a superstar because they're humble you know partly.

37:44 Everybody at Gammill including the machine owners it's like a big family

37:50 you know like just like me and him we're just like family and everybody that's at

37:56 the quilting with confidence they are all things. Well, Wayne's got us worked up.

38:02 You did this because because this this is what we were you know this is what

38:09 gets us fired up. It gets us pumped up. It's seeing the impact that the work

38:15 that we do has for ordinary people who are just trying to have a job that they

38:21 can do that also lets them go see their their grandson's hockey game in Alaska.

38:28 Yeah. What what was the hardest part? What was the thing that you had to face

38:34 and overcome when you were growing your business?

38:38 Wow.

38:44 Just getting a little confidence in what I was doing you know but you know what

38:51 people in Alaska are are different. People in Alaska, gosh I hope there's not too many on this podcast.

38:59 People in Alaska are are different. They're they're fearless I guess is a

39:05 good word to put it and they would say well can't you put a star here? I want

39:10 this there and this there and it's like okay so I started hand-guided

39:15 paper pantographs and it was like well sure I got clipart so I used to

39:24 masking tape clipart to the back of my table and set up the laser and do

39:29 whatever people wanted and then I finally just went you know what I can

39:32 freehand this I don't need any paper so you know but but yeah you just have to

39:37 be innovative and and if you're I have a friend like I said who I went to

39:43 quilting with confidence with and she strictly does edge-to-edge that's all

39:49 she does and I will tell you that this week she actually put three different

39:55 designs with three different thread colors on one quilt.

40:00 quilt. Wow. And it turned out fabulous. And she was just like. She is off the rails. She

40:05 is going crazy. Yeah. I mean, it was just like, you can do this. You know, anybody can do this.

40:12 It just, it takes a little practice. A little encouragement and they need to believe

40:16 that they can. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, so can you think of, you've seen a lot of change

40:25 and you've, you've upgraded your machine a couple of times too. But is there anything that comes to

40:31 mind as far as the technology that's changed between when you started and where we are today

40:38 that really makes things a lot easier now than it was when you started? Well,

40:44 when I started, okay. When I started, we didn't have you guys. There, there wasn't you guys. If

40:52 there were, if there was, they hid them very, very well. Who did you buy your machine from

40:58 when you started out? Tracy. Tracy Gamble. Did you know him? Ken Gamble's son. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

41:08 So, and I met Ken at Quilt Market in, I think it was either Chicago. I was teaching in Chicago.

41:20 So, I think I met him in Chicago at when they were doing Quilt Market. He's been all over the place.

41:25 And, and so, hey, somebody's going to hire me to teach. I go, you know, but yeah, different,

41:34 completely different attitude towards their machine, completely different attitude towards

41:42 what they were offering them than what Gamble has today. It's been a huge improvement. And when I

41:49 got my Statler, the fun, the funny part was the conversion from Statler to Ascend. When I got my

41:57 Statler, it was, okay, here's a computer. You can access the internet, but you're not allowed to

42:05 access the internet because, and I've met Mr. Statler too. He and his wife, delightful, delightful

42:12 people. I met them up in Oregon at a quilt show one time. And, and, and it was like, don't you

42:20 dare go on the internet because it's proprietary and it's this and it's that. And so when I, when

42:27 I was going to get my Ascend, it was like, well, make sure you've got a good solid connection to

42:32 the internet. And it was like, wait a minute, I'm not supposed to have the internet on my

42:37 quilting machine. And they were like, yeah, because everything's in the cloud. So it's,

42:44 it's much more streamlined. It's much more efficient. And, you know, I'm a, I'm a from

42:53 seat of my pants kind of person, you know, and that's how I learned because that's how it was

42:58 back then. And, you know, today, if you walked in and you walked up to a dealer and you bought

43:07 yourself an Ascend and had it put in your house, I mean, it, you would be in business in hours,

43:15 not days, which is phenomenal. I mean, if you, if you can deal with the computer,

43:21 which I still have difficulty with the computer from time to time, but we're learning,

43:29 you know, it's, it's just like, it's unbelievable how fast and easy it would be to start your

43:34 business. The hardest part would be getting your customers. And all you have to do is

43:39 make yourself available, find a quilt guild, start doing what I started doing when I got

43:46 to California was I would do the philanthropy work, you know, people for practice, you know,

43:52 you needed something to practice on, you didn't want to practice on a quilt that was somebody

43:56 was paying you for, you could practice on a philanthropy quilt, because it's going to someone,

44:03 usually a homeless person around here. And, and they were so happy to have a beautiful,

44:09 warm quilt. They didn't know that you made a mistake in your quilting.

44:14 They're not critiquing the distance between them.

44:16 Correct. You know, it's not going to a quilt show, it's not being judged,

44:20 but it gives you an opportunity to learn at really no cost, the cost of your thread.

44:28 Yeah.

44:29 And a little bit of time.

44:30 I can't tell you how many people I've talked to that have gotten invaluable experience from

44:37 doing quilts for different types of charity like that.

44:42 Concerning that, that quilting with confidence that we have one comment.

44:46 Well, we should probably just, we were ignoring the questions for a little while.

44:52 I'm just going to handle it from the top to the bottom real quick. We've got three of them.

44:57 Paula says, hi, Colleen. Apparently, she's in Chester, California, and she didn't say hi.

45:05 And then later, she did ask a question. She said, regarding quilting with confidence,

45:11 would you recommend signing up for the hand guided or foundational computerized?

45:16 I've never used a long arm before.

45:18 Well, I really like hand guided, but if you think that you're going to be a computerized operator,

45:27 the hand guided one is actually touching. That was my little, that was my only critique about

45:33 taking the Ascend side was that I never got to touch a machine. You know, I'm one of those

45:40 kind of people. But I would start with hand guided because you can always go up from there.

45:47 But it's a great start.

45:49 I would probably chime in and agree. I think that if you know yourself well enough to know

45:57 that you're not artistic, and you're a stick figure drawer, and you're going to do computer,

46:05 then take the computer one. If you have the music in your soul, and you feel like you might have

46:14 a hand guided quilter somewhere underneath those layers, if you just practice a little bit,

46:20 then I would take the hand guided side, because you'll learn a ton. And one of the things you'll

46:27 learn is if you've got anything there to work with. Some of us don't.

46:34 Music is wonderful, depending on what you're trying to quilt. It's amazing what start beat

46:40 goes through your head when you've got reggae music playing.

46:44 Yes. Hey, mom. I like to listen to music as well. So that is Paula's questions. And then we also

46:53 got one. I'm checking them off here. We also got one from Allison. She is, hopefully it's,

47:01 I haven't read this. I can attest to Quilty with Confidence. I purchased a 2006 Premier Plus in

47:08 November of 2019, just before the world shut down. Tried to do YouTube videos when the machine

47:14 was acting up with thread breakage, etc. It was awful. September of 2021, I was finally able to

47:21 go to Quilty with Confidence in Hershey, Pennsylvania. It was an absolute game changer

47:27 for me. I just opened my business for Edge to Edge in October 2023. Build up is slow,

47:33 and hoping word of mouth will get my business moving. Okay. Thank you, Allison. I think

47:39 watching all of these recordings will help. Also, I was going to ask you this question,

47:46 Colleen. Who was your biggest cheerleader? What was your support system?

47:54 Who had your back when you were doing this, building your business?

47:58 When I got to California, my mom, she had resources. It was amazing how many people

48:11 knew my mom because she taught cake decorating. She would come to play on the machine sometimes,

48:18 and she would do her designs from cake decorating with the machine. She thought that was pretty

48:24 cool. That is cool. Also, your friend that had the quilt shop, when she gave you a place to put

48:34 the machine. That was fabulous because I did the quilting, she sold the batting, and of course,

48:44 she sold fabric. She was a happy camper. When I took my machine out of there, she got a

48:52 Gamo Classic. I have a Gamo Classic. She got a Classic that had stitch regulation on it.

49:00 I was going to ask, Ann, you had mentioned that you lost your husband after you

49:06 moved down to California after losing your mom. How did he feel about the business that you were

49:17 building? He might have thought that you were crazy. That was a lot of money to send away

49:29 to Missouri, hoping a machine would show up. True. First of all, he thought I was crazy, but

49:38 we had been married for many years, so he was like, yeah, okay, whatever.

49:42 But he was a truck driver in Alaska. Because I didn't have a wholesale account to buy batting

49:52 at the time, so he would drive into Anchorage, and he would stop at JoAnn Fabrics when they had their

50:01 50% off sale, and he knew that he could get two 30-yard bolts of warm and natural batting

50:09 into the sleeper of his truck, of his tractor trailer, and bring it home to me.

50:16 So he was a great support and a great advocate. In fact, sometimes he delivered quilts for me, too.

50:26 Somebody has an 18-wheeler pull up in their neighborhood,

50:29 and a guy jumps out with a little box with a quilt in it.

50:33 And you have to understand, he also pulled petroleum products in these great big huge

50:41 tankers, and he would stop and buy batting. Yeah, cool. Well, that's awesome. Lots of

50:54 quilters are family businesses. Oh, yeah. You know, and I have been very not surprised,

51:03 actually, of how many men are quilters as well. Yes, there's a lot of them out there. Yeah.

51:11 What's something that you wish somebody would have told you when you first started?

51:17 That how addicting this is?

51:22 You have a good addiction.

51:28 You know, I was in the boonies of Alaska, so it was just trial and error. It would have been nice

51:39 if I had somebody that I could have called back then to find out why I was doing this wrong or

51:47 that wrong or, you know, put the bobbin in the wrong way, and how come it didn't look so good

51:54 on the backside. Yeah. You know, all you have to do is rip out one queen-size quilt, and you'll

52:00 never make that mistake again. Right. Well, Colleen, so you've been doing this, what was it,

52:10 99 when you first got the machine? Yes, I got my machine in 99.

52:18 Making us all feel old here. Well, here, I'll tell you this part. I didn't make my first quilt

52:24 until July of 98, so. Yeah, wow. Well, let me ask you, we're getting ready to wrap it up. Yeah.

52:34 I want to ask you one more thing, because there's a lot of people that are going to be watching

52:40 this that, you know, there's about 30 people watching right now, but there'll be hundreds

52:45 more after that that watch the recording of this. A question I want to ask on their behalf,

52:52 do you think that in today's world, in 2024, do you think that it is possible for someone to do

53:02 what you have done or what you are doing with their gamel today?

53:08 Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, I don't think that quilting is as big as it was prior to the

53:21 pandemic. I do think it's slowed down a little bit, but let me tell you, there are the dyed-in-the-wool

53:30 quilters that you find no matter where you go, and they are always looking to share their tails

53:39 and find a new quilter, and, you know, because people move away, unfortunately people pass away,

53:46 and if they can find somebody who is approachable, who does a nice job, who charges a fair rate,

53:57 then anybody could start this business. You just have to be open and honest and straightforward

54:08 and have fun. I mean, if it's work, you don't want to be doing this. This is fun.

54:15 Sometimes it's work, I have to admit, but that's why I don't do heirloom quilting.

54:19 I think she gets people pumped up. I think a lot of people want to get them pumped up.

54:26 Now you know why I travel and teach.

54:29 Yeah, yes. Well, you know, it's really hard to put your finger on, but there's something

54:38 that really feels good when you've helped somebody, you know, and all different people

54:45 experience that in their work. I know that, like my kid sister, she's a nurse,

54:50 and some days are just a grind at work, but there's often times that she gets a real sense

54:57 of satisfaction in her work because she was able to help somebody, and the same thing goes for the

55:03 guy that works on cars in the auto garage, you know. Somebody drags in their minivan with four

55:11 kids and they quit on the highway, and he gets them up and running again, and you know, that's

55:18 whatever line of work you're in, a lot of times you're able to help people, and in the world that

55:24 you're in doing these quilts for people, they come to you with this quilt top, and you say,

55:29 oh, well, you know, who is this quilt for? And they'll tell you about their niece that's going

55:34 to college, and she wants to have this quilt for her, and she always loved dolphins, and is there

55:40 something you could do? You know, it's a very satisfying type of work that you're in.

55:46 Oh, it is, and this right now is the season for t-shirt quilts, you know, all the kids that

55:52 are graduating from high school, you know, they got to have the t-shirt quilt, send them off to

55:56 college with their t-shirt quilt. They're really big right now. Yeah, yeah, yeah, well, there's so

56:06 many things going through my mind while you were talking. With the pandemic and everything,

56:11 you know, me and Andrew were talking about this earlier, you know, we hear a Gammill,

56:16 you know, we sense the lull and everything when the pandemic went through, but now everything,

56:22 there's, you know, you just sense that everything's roaring, been roaring back to life,

56:28 and everything's going good. My encouragement for people that are watching, if you're able to

56:35 go to that quilting with confidence, I'm really excited about that, and it will really change

56:43 your life for the better in the quilting world. Yeah, we diverted a lot of the money that had

56:48 previously been spent on traveling to shows and having all the machines in a booth, because,

56:57 you know, that was something that was done long ago to, you know, show people what the

57:02 Gammill machine looks like and to write up some orders at the show and whatever, and that's kind

57:08 of, we have orders come in every day for new machines, so we don't have to go to shows to

57:15 write up orders, and so we were looking at everything we were spending on going to shows,

57:20 and we thought, you know, if we diverted the manpower, the resources, the diesel, you know,

57:27 the money, and if instead of spending 15 minutes with people or 30 minutes with people,

57:33 what if we could grab ahold of them for two or three days and really, really pour our knowledge,

57:42 pour our teaching, pour our experience into their life, and let them share with each other, you know,

57:50 what that could do, and it has been such a tremendous return on investment as far as,

57:57 you know, we just, we weren't moving the needle when we would go to shows, because all you do

58:02 there is write up orders, and like I said, we already write up orders every day, so it really

58:09 has made it possible for people to advance their art and to maybe tiptoe into things they've been

58:17 afraid of doing before, like your friend who just did her first quilt that wasn't just basic

58:23 row by row, so definitely cool. Well, we are at great risk of going over time-wise, Colleen, because

58:31 you're a heck of a lot of fun to talk to, but I just wanted to say thank you for joining us here,

58:37 and if there's any sort of, sometimes people have a question later, or they'll watch somebody

58:44 recording later and have a question, if you have a Facebook page, or an email address, or something

58:51 that you want to share, this would be a time that you could put that out there. Yeah, how can people

58:57 get in touch with you? I have a website called Sew Little Time Quilting dot com. Sew Little Time

59:07 Quilting dot com, with the S-E-W. Yep. Okay, perfect, awesome, and also for the people watching

59:16 or listening, if you have any questions, you want to know more about the Quilting with Confidence,

59:21 just contact us at GAML, and we'll be glad to talk to you more about that. Or contact me,

59:27 because I'm not a salesman. There you go, there you go. All right, well, thank you so much for

59:34 being here with us, and for everybody who's listening, if you want to share this episode

59:40 with a friend, go ahead and do that. There's also, on some of these ways, on YouTube, you can give it

59:46 a little thumbs up icon, and you can subscribe, and if you're on a podcasting platform, I think

59:52 Apple's the main one where you can give it five stars and subscribe. We don't ever expect that

59:58 there'll be lots and lots of people.

1:00:00 who are listening to these recordings.

1:00:02 These are for a select number of people

1:00:04 who have a dream and want to pursue it or pursue it better.

1:00:09 Thank you everybody for joining us

1:00:10 and we will see you next week.

1:00:12 Darlene, thank you very much.

1:00:14 All right, thank you, it was very fun.

1:00:16 Bye-bye. Take care.