Welcome to the 
Knick Knack Shop Online

We thought that we would let the words of Pat Olsen tell you the Knit Knack Story and its history. We hope that you will enjoy finding out a little bit about us.

We are currently a dealer for and carry the full line of Silver Reed knitting machines and Design-A-Knit computer knitting program. We also have other used knitting equipment available. We are the United States and Canadian importers for Tamm Yarns; we are also the central US importer for Bramwell Yarns. We are the United States importer for the Hague linking machine. We also the manufacturer of Cotton Tale 8 Yarn.

We host Spring Fling, a machine knitting seminar, each year during the 3rd Friday and Saturday in April. Check our seminar site for more details.

If you are visiting Indiana or just driving through, we would like for you to drop in and see us.
Whether it's during our seminar or during the work week, you are always welcome. We are open Monday through Friday, 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., except holidays
 

HAPPY KNITTING!







Hobby Knitter Turned Pro Spins a Story for Success

In a day when it takes two incomes to equal one livelihood, many people dream of kicking over the traces, dumping the demands of the boss, and leaving the beaten track of the old 9 to 5 system. If they can work so productively for the corporation, what they wonder, might they accomplish if they turned their energies into their own business enterprise.

Charlene Shafer, a veteran shop owner, is a perfect example of a hobby knitter turned pro, who can now boast of a business nearly 20 years old. But don't expect the Fortune 500 people to believe that her company could even exist in today's high-tech world.

Location, location, location is the maxim of every business orientation class of the'90s. If you want to go into business for yourself, you have to find a product everyone wants and then plant it in the middle of a good-sized city. Charlene Shafer's Knit Knack Shop isn't exactly at the crossroads of the Internet, but when she first opened her shop in 1978, today's business professionals were still in diapers and she hadn't heard that there was an onus on opening a shop in the middle of a cornfield.

"That's exactly where it is," laughs Charlene. "We are located near Peru, Indiana, out in the country, and there are cornfields on all sides of us. We're set off the road a bit, and the zoning laws won't even let us put up a sign to direct travelers to our shop."

Not the best place to open a business, you say? Guess again! Charlene and her husband, Harold, who gave up the farming life to come into the shop full time, having established a thriving concern that serves all of Indiana. They are that state's Brother distributor, but beyond that, Knit Knack also has four full-time employees (now five) to serve the needs of a clientele that comes not just from neighboring Peru, but from half a dozen states all around and even from Canada, to get a look at one of the best-stocked shops in the Midwest.

"I had knitting machines since before I had children," Charlene says. "I was a farm wife who waited at home for my husband to send me off to get a part for some piece of equipment that was always breaking down. I knit because I loved it and when the opportunity came to buy the very shop from which I purchased my first machine, well, there really wasn't a question of whether I should turn my hobby into my business."

In truth, Charlene probably had enough "extra" yarn at home to restock the shelves of her newly acquired business, but what serious knitter doesn't? What she brought to the business besides her love of knitting was a close connection with friends and neighbors of her rural community, plus a strong family tie. Her mother, who lives next door on her farm property, was the perfect grandma to take care of the four little Shafer children when she wasn't helping out in the shop. Charlene's husband eventually realized that running a cozy shop beat out endlessly riding the John Deere around, so he joined her as a much valued partner. Son, Noel, is in charge of advertising and yarn purchasing. He toddled around the shop as a youngster, so it's safe to say that he is at home in the family business.

Charlene's daughters are all knitters. Although they have not yet joined their parents and older brother in the shop, they all consider the knitting machine to be a household appliance. Daughter, Tricia, is currently working as a knitwear designer in New York (Geoffrey Beene division of Philips VanHeausen), and her patterns regularly find their way back to Peru, Indiana.

But does knitting become something other than pleasure when the very design of the next jacket or sweater is all tied up in economics? According to Charlene, she loves to knit now just as much as she always has. She and her one non-family member employee (now two with the addition of Carolyn Moon), Darlene (Garber), love to design and knit. It's their part of the business, and they work well together developing techniques and designing patterns. They are probably the best customers the shop has when it comes to purchasing yarns, but their labors of love are showing up in knitting magazines and books as inspiring new pieces of work for hundreds of clients to view.

Anyone who has looked at one of Charlene Shafer's knitwear designs will notice one very important feature - they fit a wide range of sizes. All women are not created equal when it comes to bust and hips. The lady who buys a 24 or 26 off the rack needs comfortable yet elegant fashions as much as the one who buys a size 8. It isn't quite as simple as adding a few extra stitches to accomplish the extra measurement. Charlene has found that the larger the garment, the more complex the techniques become.

Charlene has directed many lovely patterns in this venue. She realized way back when she was custom knitting for friends and neighbors that yarn grows not only inches, but in weight. Weight equals sag, and sag will suddenly throw off the original tension and gauge arrived at by working with a potholder-size swatch. What looked good on paper might not work in actuality when yarn multiplies itself many times and stretches by sheer bulk. Today's fashionably attired and well-knit larger lady can thank Charlene for taking the guesswork out of pattern construction.

Even though Knit Knack has a middle-of-the-cornfield business address, don't for a minute think that it isn't totally savvy when it comes to dealing with customers. In the past few years, the physical shop has undergone several reconstructions to make it bigger and to better suit customers' needs. The shop is a hub of diversification as well. While it is a living to sell machines, yarns and books, it is a business to hold seminars -- three of them -- during the year. It is dedication to search out over 900 book titles for the serious knitter. It is a luxury to handle at least seven brands of yarn in all their glorious variations. In short, the shop might be in the middle of a cornfield, but it's mentality is pure Madison Avenue.

Charlene has a theory about the shop's success. She says it's because country folk have a little more time on their hands to the kinds of crafts they so enjoy. That might be so, but in the case of Knit Knack, success is also about sincere customer service and the desire to always provide exactly what a project calls for.

What a bonus that one woman in America is doing exactly what she wants, where she wants to live, with friends she has known all of her life and with the wholehearted physical and emotional support of her family. Who could ask for more?

The proceeding was an article from Machine Knitters Sources January/February 1996 issue, written by Pat Olsen, as a designer profile.