It all started in 1969! Yes, more than 50 years ago, the E-Z Knit Fabrics store was born in Colville, Washington (a small city sandwiched roughly between Spokane and the Canadian border). After taking a “Stretch & Sew” class (based around a line of garment patterns of the same name), Vickie Black convinced her mother to quit her job at JCPenney to open a knit fabric store.

“My mom and I traveled to Portland, Oregon where we bought designer cuts of leftover fabrics from Jantzen and White Stag,” Vickie recalls. Home with a carload of these fabrics, they threw them on a table and officially opened the doors to their fabric shop. E-Z Knit Fabrics quickly became popular, so they gradually added patterns, notions, and other items as the business grew. “Mom ran the store during the day and I taught sewing classes at night. The scariest part of instructing classes was when my Home Economics teacher enrolled in one!”

E-Z Knit Fabrics’ uniqueness lies in its offering of a wide array of products across different craft categories. They currently carry a lot of unusual or hard-to-find items. For instance, their first venture away from knits were fabrics meant for skiing and snowmobiling. Then, they added fabrics for lingerie and swimwear. “We are really known for our extensive inventory which includes silk, wool, wedding, and designer fabrics—everything from knits to fleece, flannel, cotton, home décor, denim, and nylon fabrics,” Vickie says. “Fabric panels have become increasingly desirable, and we are known for having an exceptionally large inventory of panels for those quicker projects.” In addition, they’ve noticed an uptick in their customers making bags of all types and sizes, and they like to offer an extensive selection of yarn, beads, and needlework materials. “Colville is blessed to have E-Z Knit Fabrics as one of the largest fabric stores in Eastern Washington. It is not the largest by square footage, but by product volume and a heart to please the customer! That is the uniqueness of our shop.”

They are also a retailer of BERNINA sewing machines. Starting as a sub-dealer in 1970, Vickie has strengthened her relationship with BERNINA and her following through education and customer service. “As a shop, we also provide our customers with the best sewing machine service, and repairs, no matter the make or model,” Vickie says. “We also contract an individual to sharpen scissors, clippers and even garden loppers.” In addition to selling BERNINA machines and accessories, they also carry Silhouette digital cutting machines, Accuquilt fabric cutters, dyes, and a huge library of books for just about any craft topic.

Currently, Vickie and her staff are seeing trends like a resurgence of garment sewing as well as craft projects  such as beading and needle felting. “Our customers are diverse, and our visitors range from beginners to masters,” Vickie says. “We currently have a huge community of quilters, but it does not stop there. We have all types of crafters, sewing enthusiasts, and crochet and knitting groupies as well.” E-Z Knit Fabrics has attracted their varied customer base by offering the specialty items these creative artists seek out. As a staff, they aim to please and accommodate their customers, even if it means hunting down a particular product they are searching for.

Caption: SIY Apron Project

As far as their in-person sewing classes, E-Z Knit Fabrics has offered beginner sewing and quilting lessons, a sewing “study hall” (open sewing hours), occasional Silhouette project classes, and knitting classes. One bright spot for customers has been the SIY – Sew It Yourself program. “We plan to use the SIY program as a base for beginning sewing classes, and look forward to what is coming this year,” Vickie says. “The SIY projects have been popular because they are simple with very well-written instructions.” As the times have changed after the COVID-19 pandemic and internet tutorials have grown, the staff has explored alternate ways of teaching such as creating videos of live classes that will reach outlying customers as well as the local ones.

Being so close to the Canadian border, E-Z Knit Fabrics has always had a very large portion of their business come from Canadian trade, but that was disrupted by the pandemic. “Today we are beginning to see a few of our Canadian friends coming back and are delighted by that”, Vickie says. “We are really a destination store and have customers regularly traveling great distances from Spokane and other cities.”

Prior to the pandemic, the store was known for hosting groups including those who gathered to sew charity quilts and other projects. “During COVID, the store slowed down in traffic; however, we have a website where you can buy anything we have in the store, ” Vickie says. “Due to the pandemic, we were a part of a few stores that had our customers making masks for firefighters, first responders, and such. Over 30,000 masks were produced!”

For attracting new customers, Vickie and her staff can count on word-of-mouth referrals, their website, Facebook page, and an Etsy Store. They also regularly take part in events around the area, as well as running fun promotions to keep customers coming back. For instance, during the months that have five Saturdays, they host have a “Fifth Saturday Sale” where customers can earn a bag for free or choose to buy one. “On the day of the sale, whatever they can fit in the bag qualifies for 20% off,” Vickie says. “We also have a promotion called the Purple Bag Club. We e-mail members with exclusive news, discounts, and more. Whenever they shop, the receipt goes into a hat for a drawing to win a prize every, which is awarded every six weeks or so.”

One very popular event that they’ve chosen to discontinue is the “Moonlight Madness Sale”. “We started at 9pm with a discount and after midnight, everything was ½ price,” Vickie says. “We showed movies on the street, and it was considered the social event of the year! Customers traveled from far distances. Some customers even planned their vacations around it.” Though there are so many fun stories from those sales, Vickie admits that the staff worked all night long and it turned out to be more hassle than it was worth.

Even still, customers know that E-Z Knit fabrics is a place to have fun and try new things. “The most fun thing to do in the store is to try out the many sewing machines on display,” Vickie says. “This is exciting to customers! The staff use these machines to work on store sample projects and works of their own.” Customers also love it when they see their own projects show up on the shop’s Facebook page (for a “show and tell” feature) as well as samples for upcoming classes.

E-Z Knit Fabrics

165 N Main St. Colville, WA 99114

509-684-2644

www.ezknit.com

facebook.com/EZKnitFabrics