Planning a project for a friend who wants to learn some quilting. I wanted to buy a kaffe fassett charm pack so usually I'd go online, but I wanted aqua colours and the nearest colourway was too green so I thought I'd choose a few FQs. John Lewis has long stocked these fabrics so off I hop onto a nasty sweaty tube. To find out they don't stock Rowan fabrics at all anymore. The man suggested I try Liberty so I went there, knowing the mark-up would be high but not wanting my trip to be wasted and thinking I would save p&p, plus I wanted to be able to have the fabrics in front of me to match and compare which is difficult online.
The minimum cut for the lovely selection of kaffe fassett fabrics by Rowan (probably all fabrics) is half a metre. Half a metre! For quilting fabrics! No quilter in their right mind will shop there, it would only be good to select the fabrics and note down the pattern name and colour to order elsewhere; but if nobody buys they'll stop stocking them.
Especially as they do stock the charm packs (I wanted a colourway that is available as well as aqua colours) but the price... A reputable online seller of quilting supplies, with a bricks and mortar shop as well (so no dodgy eBay nonsense) sells them at £9.50. At Liberty they are £25. Yrs you did read that correctly; twenty five pounds. I'd expect maybe £12 because it is Liberty, but over two and a half times as expensive!?!?!
Went home and ordered online as best I could so fingers crossed the aqua fabrics coordinate...