So. What's going on? Advice, please. November 13, 2014 18:34 17 Comments

I’m sorry to hear that after all your work. Now, I’m not really target market, being an infrequent buyer of vintage patterns and not living in the US. But, I’ve just been surfing your site and I can let you know that on a less than optimal, but normally adequate, cable connection, the thumbnails take a looong time to load. It’s taken me ten mins to look at the first three categories under 1930s. I’ll try again later, but it might be worth checking if you can get away with a lower image size on the ‘choose a pattern’ pages.
Good luck!

I am so sorry to hear about the drastic downturn in business. Perhaps my observations will help a little.
For several years I avidly collected vintage patterns and visited The Blue Gardenia a lot. Last year I edited down my stash, and buy infrequently now. Now I’m looking again, and visited The Blue Gardenia today for the first time in ages.
I clicked on a decade, and initially thought that what came up on screen were all of the patterns in that category. That struck me as strange, as I’d known you to have a pretty large stock in the past.
Then I noticed that patterns are arranged by company and that within each decade users can see all of one company’s patterns grouped together. Great—now I knew what to do. I could look at all of the Vogues, or Buttericks, etc.
I am wondering whether some—even many—visitors make the mistake I did at first, and came to the wrong conclusion that they had seen all of your stock from a particular decade when in fact they had not.
Another observation: I look at patterns when I want to fill a gap in my wardrobe. So uppermost in my mind is a garment type. Which company the pattern comes from doesn’t matter a whole lot to me.
These days I’m looking for coat patterns. When I go to a pattern vendor and have to search by company, and don’t have the option of keyword-searching a garment type, that makes my search significantly more work.
When I put “coat” in your search box, I got a list of blog posts. They probably were interesting and informative, but they weren’t relevant to my search objective.
I did tens of thousands of database searches in my years as a librarian and can be pretty dogged in my approach. On the other hand, I like convenience as much as anybody. My search for coat patterns just now on Rusty Zipper was more intuitive, faster, and to the point than my experience on this site.
I hope that you can pinpoint and solve the problem soon. I’m sure I speak for all vintage pattern lovers: we owe a lot to you vendors for making our collections and lives richer. Thank you!

I too am sorry to hear about the down turn in business, especially as I think this site is so much of an improvement on the old.
I would like to echo Paula’s comments, particularly about the search function and the ease of finding particular styles. If I could add some other ideas, I also think it would be helpful to see the sizing without having to click through to the bigger image. I am aware that one can grade any pattern but I’m not sure I have the time or patience for that. Although if you are going to suggest customers do grade patterns to size a handy link on “how to” May be useful.
I also find the line drawings enable me to appreciate the design details better, especially when patterned or heavily textured fabric has been used in the photography. If it is possible to include a thumbnail image of the line drawings that might help pique the interest of some.
Just a few thoughts. Fingers crossed business picks up for you
(I will be putting in my order over the weekend)

I have forwarded this to Mr. Webby. Thank you so much.

We do line drawings but not yardage info. I will take that into consideration. We have more patterns than Rusty Zipper, so that may be why it is so much more time-consuming. You may search either the blog or the patterns.Thank you for your well-thought out comment. Appreciate it.

The sizing is on the pattern envelope. It it too small to see, perhaps? I think the search takes longer because we have SO MANY patterns. I got 7 pages of coats to Zipper’s 1. I have thought about the grading link. I personally buy only my size for my collection and don’t know how to grade. I would hate to steer someone to a site that doesn’t grade properly. I very much appreciate your thoughts and have passed them on to Mr. Webby.

Eager to fill your order! SHop away. We just added nearly 100 vintage patterns today!

Being new to this site I’ve only made one purchase, and can’t say if the new site is better. The problem with this layout is that it’s time consuming. To see if there’s any new patterns I have to click through each category in each decade. The front page should show the newest additions.

Hi, Renate,

We add so many patterns, it would be impossible to list them all on page one. I can start adding each category that is updated to the blog, though. Then you only have to check the new categories.

I don’t think new customers will check the blog page. They’ll probably jump straight to a decade, click a few brands and give up. Maybe have a “show all” option under each decade, listed by newest added and with more items per page? My most used online store (not sewing related, but a one man run operation) have a small section on the bottom of their home page that shows the last 12 items added, and a link that takes you to the rest of the newly added items.

HELLO, DENISE;

I HAVE JUST RECEIVED MY VINTAGE VOGUE PATTERN AND AM DELIGHTED WITH IT. AS FOR YOUR WEBSITE, I DON’T REMEMBER WHAT IT USED TO BE LIKE. AND I HAVE ONLY PURCHASED ONCE SO I GUESS YOU WON’T BE MAKING A HUGE AMOUNT OF MONEY ON ME! BUT FOR WHAT IT’S WORTH, TROLLING OVER YOUR PAGES NOW, I CERTAINLY ENJOY IT VERY MUCH. HERE ARE SOME THOUGHTS:

I WOULD AGREE WITH ONE OF THE PREVIOUSLY MADE OBSERVATIONS ABOUT SEARCHING FOR PATTERNS. I DON’T CARE MUCH EITHER ABOUT WHO MAKES THEM. IF THEY WERE ORDERED BY CATEGORY, IT WOULD BE EASIER TO SEARCH. AS SOMEONE WHO IS INTERESTED IN VINTAGE FASHIONS, BUT NOT NECESSARILY IN DESIGNERS, IF I COULD LOOK AT ALL 1940S SKIRTS, FOR EXAMPLE, THAT WOULD BE FASTER THAN LOOKING THROUGH ALL THE VARIOUS COMPANIES’ PATTERNS, HOPING THERE WILL BE A SKIRT IN THERE SOMEWHERE.

YES, I PURCHASED A VOGUE PATTERN, BUT I WOULDN’T HAVE CARED WHO DESIGNED IT IF I LIKED THE LOOK OF IT. I PURCHASED IT FOR THE DESIGN NOT THE DESIGNER!

GENERALLY, HOWEVER, I THINK YOUR WEBSITE IS WONDERFUL. AS A SELF-EMPLOYED SMALL BUSINESS PERSON, IT BREAKS MY HEART TO THINK YOU SPENT LOTS OF MONEY TO CREATE A NEW SITE AND YOUR SALES HAVE DROPPED SO DRAMATICALLY.

IS IT ALSO POSSIBLE THAT YOUR SITE IS VERY NICHE-ORIENTED AND THAT A DROP IN SALES MAY ALSO BE EVIDENCE OF THE POOR ECONOMY? I WOULD CONSIDER YOUR SITE TO BE SELLING WHAT ONE COULD CONSIDER TO BE LUXURY ITEMS. NO, THE PRICES ARE NOT THROUGH THE ROOF, FOR SURE. BUT, IN HARD TIMES, MANY OF US SIMPLY CANNOT AFFORD TO PURCHASE ANYTHING WE DON’T ABSOLUTELY NEED.

I WORK IN THEATRE, IN A SMALL, REMOTE HISTORICAL GOLD RUSH MINING TOWN AND I CAN TELL YOU, TOURSM TO OUR SITE HAS DROPPED CONSIDERABLY OVER THE YEARS, DUE TO POOR ECONOMY AND ALSO PEOPLE’S CHANGING TASTES AS REGARDS TO HOW THEY SPEND THEIR TRAVEL DOLLARS.

MAYBE SOMETHING IS CHANGING IN YOUR NICHE AS WELL. EXAMPLE: I HAVE A GOOD FRIEND WHO IS THE OWNER/OPERATOR OF A COSTUME RENTAL STORE. FOR YEARS, SHE DID FABULOUS BUSINESS, WITH EACH YEAR MORE INCREASES IN SALES. NOW FOR THE FIRST TIME IN 20 YEARS OF BUSINESS, HER SALES HAVE DROPPED IN A HUGE WAY – DUE TO ONLINE SHOPPING AND BIG BOX STORES COMPETING WITH HER ON ITEMS THAT ARE CHEAP, NOW SHE HAS LOST THOSE PEOPLE WHO CAN BUY CHEAP STUFF ONLINE FROM CHINA WHERE THOSE PEOPLE USE TO RENT FROM HER. THERE IS A HUGE DEMOGRAPHIC WHO DON’T COME INTO HER STORE ANYMORE. ALSO IN HER CASE, HER WEBSITE IS NOT UP TO DATE ENOUGH, WHICH SHE KNOWS…

I TELL THIS STORY JUST TO MAKE THE CASE THAT THE WORLD HAS CHANGED SO DRASTICALLY IN THE LAST FEW YEARS. NOTHING IS CERTAIN. I’M TRYING TO IMAGINE WHAT MIGHT BE CHANGING IN YOUR WORLD TO CAUSE SUCH A DOWNTURN, BUT HOPEFULLY THIS WILL BECOME CLEAR AND YOU WILL BE ABLE TO WEATHER THE DOWNTURN. YOUR SITE IS LOVELY TO LOOK AT AND I HOPE IT WILL BE PROFITABLE FOR YOU AGAIN IN THE VERY NEAR FUTURE.

I hope things have improved since you made this post. I have only just come to your website (on my iPhone) after a recommendation, and I can say that I love your site. I wandered through all your lingerie patterns and found just what I was looking for, and purchased them! I am looking forward to doing some more wandering and more purchasing. Just don’t tell my husband!

I think that your site navigates easily from a mobile device, and the checkout process was also straight forward. Your web designer has done a tremendous job in designing this site. Maybe the downturn has more to do with other economic factors and less to do with your new site???

I love your new site! I’m so sorry that sales are down – I hope things are starting to pick up.
One thing that might be affecting your web traffic and sales is that folks who try to shop at work (like me) aren’t allowed to visit your page because something is triggering the blocking program. When I tried to visit your page from my work computer, I received the big “fun blocker” message that access was denied. Maybe there’s something on your end that you can reword so it doesn’t trip the workplace blockers? If you’re interested, I can send you more information about what my particular message is in case there’s something you can do.

Posts are very infrequent; it has been more than two months since your last blog post, and earlier in the year, posts seem to be happening once a month or so… This inactivity leads me to believe there is nothing new and interesting in your pattern collection. If you are not going to take the time to post and feature a pattern or suggest there is something new to consider, I am not going to stop by your site. My time is limited, too!, and there is an increasing amount of content online to explore around sewing projects,, patterns, and fabrics.

Thank you for those kind words!

That saddens me to hear. I asked my web guy and he couldn’t find anything. That would be the new web guy. He will be trying to repair the problems we have had with the new design since it went up.

Thank you so much for your thoughtful reply. You may well be right about the economy.

You break my heart. You mean new customers don’t rush to read my inspiring posts?