How Many Times Have You Changed The Direction of Your Sewing Career?

A few weeks ago I had a call from a lady who wanted information about our Profitable Clothing Alteration Business book.  She told me she had been doing garment sewing, but that the sewing had been really slow so she was wanting to start taking in alterations.  She said she needed more information about alterations in order to start that aspect of her sewing business.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about my own sewing “life”, and how many directions my sewing has gone.  I started out doing alterations, then as customers asked if I’d make them some pants, a dress or skirt, my sewing business shifted that direction.  Then when my military husband was transferred to Taiwan, I once again shifted my interest to pattern making, as there was no opportunity to do either sewing or alterations in Taiwan.  Pattern making became my love, and I became involved in teaching pattern making classes, then expanded to writing the information in book and class form and putting it on the internet so those living across the country or around the world could participate in the classes.  PatternsThatFitYou became the avenue to get my pattern making classes out to the public.

My daughter and business partner, Denise, seems to have a real knack for figuring out what people need and want (in many cases it’s because of HER need for the items).  In high school her first job was doing alterations at home for dry cleaners because her busy school schedule wouldn’t allow her to have a job with set hours.  In college her interest changed somewhat to scarves – she loved the way scarves could dress up and change her minimal wardrobe.  The result of her interest in scarves resulted in her writing her best selling book to this day – 101 Ways To Tie A Scarf.  Later, when her first born son came along, she couldn’t find any patterns or garments that would allow her to breast feed the baby comfortably.  Once again, the direction of her sewing interest changed – this time was to create fashionable nursing clothing, not only for herself, but for others who were also in need of nursing garments.  And now, because of the economy and job losses in her family, she has once again been put to the test – and this time a major change of direction was required.  In order to help feed her five children under the age of 5 (4 year old quadruplets and their big brother who is 5), she started cutting every coupon she could get her hands on.   She started using coupons upon coupons to cut the dollars being spent on food and necessities.  With mountains of coupons growing, she needed a way to catagorize and file them so they could be easily seen and used.  This time her “need” was filled by the Coupon Clutch coupon carrier she designed and hand made.  It appears that there are many others doing the same couponing from the amount of orders she has for the coupon clutch, and interest in her ShopperStrategy blog that gives all the ins and outs of using coupons effectively, as well as giving links to freebies and good deals. 

I believe Denise just about takes the prize for the number of times she’s changed the direction of her sewing career! 

How about you?  How many times have you made changes in your sewing career?  We’d love to hear about it and see if you can top Denise’s list of “changes”.