Made In Chicago: Summer Tour Of Knitting Patterns eBook
By Betsy Mikel in Arts & Entertainment on Jun 18, 2010 7:00PM
If you plan to spend your lazy summer days knitting, has Sweatshop of Love got something special for you. Founder and owner Allyson Dykhuizen just released Summer Tour of Knitting Patterns, a new eBook with 10 brand spanking new patterns. Dykhuizen, who has been making a name for herself with Chicago-based knitting classes, events, and even a book club, has been writing patterns for a few years. The next move was a book, so she worked with a graphic designer to put it together.
We don’t know much about the business of selling knitting patterns, so we asked Dykhuizen if it was challenging to make money from them. Can’t you just get that stuff for free online? “For sure!” she said. “Everyone loves free knitting patterns. But with anything you get what you pay for. When you buy a pattern, you understand that the designer got that pattern tested and proofed, and it should be pretty error-free and as perfect as possible.” So it makes sense that Summer Tour of Knitting Patterns is selling pretty well. Part of the eBook’s success has to do with the quality of Dykhuizen’s work. She is cutting the guesswork out of knitting for her customers and offering them a streamlined and professional product. And the rest of the eBook’s success is a result of Dykhuizen’s relationships with other knitters and designers, both in Chicago and around the country. As authors of all genres know, promotion is half the work behind a successful book. Dykhuizen has a lengthy mailing list from all the knitters that have come to her classes and events, and her patterns are getting a lot of attention on ravelry.com (kind of like a Facebook for knitters).
Dykhuizen is already working on a winter eBook, which should be out in October. She’s aiming for eight new patterns, so between knitting, teaching, writing, and testing patterns, she’ll be busy until then.