Just the Quilt Facts

by Steffani McChesney

Every three years Quilter’s Newsletter Magazine and the International Quilt Market & Festival conduct a survey called Quilting in America. The survey was first conducted in 1994 to see how many quilters there were in the U.S. and how much time and money they spent on their hobby. A core group known as dedicated quilters was used to determine the statistics. Here are some of the most interesting results as reported in the 2003 survey published in the January 2004 issue of Quilter’s Newsletter.

The average dedicated quilter is defined as:  99% female, 58 years old, well educated (76% attended college), affluent (average annual household income of $88,397), spends an average of $1,934 per year on quilting, and has been quilting on average for 12 years.

Eighty-one percent of dedicated quilters have a separate room for sewing and quilting only. These rooms contain an average of $5,542 worth of quilting tools and supplies, $2,860 worth of fabric and two sewing machines.

In the last year the dedicated quilter purchased an average of 100 yards of fabric at an average price of $7.67 per yard. Their favorite patterns were small-scale floral prints (78%), tone-on-tone neutrals (68%), and holiday prints (68%). Most purchased colors were jewel tones (34%), bright colors (25%), and pastels (24%).

Dedicated quilters love to read. They purchased an average of 5.5 books last year at an average cost of $21.80 each and subscribed to or read 4.2 magazines per month.

And they are computer literate. Eighty-four percent of dedicated quitters own a computer and spend an average of 2.2 hours per week on quilting websites.

Changes since the last survey three years ago include:  the number of quilters has grown by 1.55 million to 21.31 million, the U.S. quilting industry has grown by 26% to $2.27 billion, dedicated quilters (5.21% of all quilters) account for 94.7% of total quilt industry expenditures annually, casual quilters (94.8% of all quilters) spend $121 million annually.

Now I hope I haven’t put you to sleep with all these statistics but I wanted you to know how big our hobby is and how it is growing. This is not just a bunch of little old ladies quilting in the church basement on Wednesday afternoons anymore. This is big business. That’s why our guild has grown to 300 members and we can support three quilt shops and three fabric shops who cater to quilters in Bakersfield and two quilt shops in Tehachapi. By the way, I’m not going to let my husband read this article. I know where I fit in this survey. The facts will kill him, or me.