Preaching to the converted

There are 333 knitters in the Australian knitter's group on ravelry. Assuming most of them are in Australia, I'd say that is a fairly big group of knitters.

There are over 120 blogs in the ANZ blogring.

Some of the most beautiful and most respected craft blogs belong to Australians.

Apparently, knitting is undergoing a resurgence, allegedly it's popularity has been increasing steadily for the past five to ten years. (I have no idea where the data comes from for these claims, who really knows if it's true or not? All evidence appears to be anecdotal or based on the popularity of internet based knitting groups, which isn't evidence of a greater knitting population, merely of a greater online knitting population.) Do I sound like an accountant yet?

Knitting in public is certainly more popular. Knitting groups are certainly on the rise.

A google search of 'knitting blogs' gleans more than 1,720,000 results.

But what are all these knitters knitting with?

Without question, the most popular yarn at my local yarn store is panda magnum - the shitty acrylic. And most customers baulk at the price of that. It's rare for someone to come in and really appreciate the higher end yarns, and even rarer for them to appreciate these yarns AND buy some.

Why are so many Australian knitters happy to knit with stuff they got for 50c a ball in GO-LO or the Reject Shop?

The reason I ask this is because for a long long time I've been thinking about importing the gorgeous Louet Gems Merino wholesale, and setting up a small online retail operation. It's all in the twist - there is no local alternative as good - this yarn is as good as merino gets. Believe me, I've looked and looked. So has she - and she's practically got the earth's entire yarn database in her head. Go on, send her an email with a question - I bet she's got the answer. Make it a hard question.

It would be a cottage-business, not big volumes, and certainly not have an expectation to make a killing (oh perish the thought of a vulgar profit being enjoyed - that wouldn't do at all!). But, you know, there is a wide range of outcomes between being not viable and making a killing.



I'd like it to fall somewhere in between those two extremes. Otherwise it'll be a mighty expensive way of getting the yarn to make the interweave mirepoix bodice won't it?