start a quilting business or not

[Jo H.]

My son and I are considering buying a machine and start quilting for others instead of paying to get all my tops done. Anyone tell me if we would make enough to pay for a machine?

[Jo H.]

It's hard to saying as there are a lot of variables. If you are a great salesperson and can market your service than I dont see why you couldn't recoup the cost.

[Linda J.]

Here are a few things to consider in order to have a successful quilting business. Do you have space for the machine, batting, threads, rulers and other things needed. You need good lighting. You are going to need a variety of colors of thread and batting. You need to practice, practice , practice on the new longarm before you do any customers quilts. Build your library of designs to show potential customers, or some of the quilts you have finished. There is soooo much more to having a successful business. The machine can pay for it's self, IF you do enough quilts per month. So think realistically about how much time you can devote to quilting each day. I have a base charge for edge to edge designs and charge more for border designs, ruler work, stencils, micro quilting and ect.