Billing for your cloth and dress shop in Meghalaya
Cloth by the metre, a jacket by the piece and a hand-woven length with a maker's name, on one bill.
One roll for a whole choir, three busy seasons, and a shawl nobody can place
One roll of cloth, a church choir and a week of metres
A church choir wants the same cloth for every member before Christmas. Members come on different days for a metre or two each, and you have one roll on the shelf. By the last day the roll is finished, the next roll is a slightly different shade, and the last singer stands in the shop with a cloth that does not match the rest.
Jackets, school uniforms and party dress each have their own month
The cold months bring jackets and sweaters, the weeks before school opens bring uniform cloth in each school's colour, and December brings party dress. Every peak needs different stock and a different order to the supplier. You remember last year by feel, and by the time you remember, the supplier's stock has gone.
Customers put the shawls back on the wrong pile
Customers pick up shawls, look, and put them back on whichever pile is nearest. By evening the hand-woven pile holds a few factory shawls and the factory pile a few hand-woven ones, and each pile is priced as one. A sale made on a guess at the pile is a sale made at the wrong price, either for you or for the weaver.
A choir's page, a weaver's page and a warning for the cloth every school asks for
Credit book (khata)
A page for the choir, with each member's metres added under its name, so the treasurer reads one total after Christmas.
Orders to suppliers
The order for the uniform cloth, written from last year's metres of grey, white and bottle green, with what arrived ticked against what you asked for.
Online orders
A mother in a far village opens the shop's own online page, sees the school colours and sends the metres her child needs.
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Piece by woven piece, a roll shared out by the metre, and last year's uniform weeks
Each woven piece on its own line
A Garo dakmanda is woven on a backstrap loom, usually with bold geometric designs, so no two are the same. Enter each piece as its own item with its own rate. When it sells, that line is gone, and at the end of the week you can see which designs left the shop and which are still on the shelf.
The choir's dark blue cloth, shared out metre by metre
Give the carol choir one page. Each singer's metres go on it when she buys, and the stock of that cloth goes down by the same metres. On the third day you can see how much dark blue is left, and you order the rest before the last singers walk in.
Which handloom designs left in the weeks before Christmas
Open last year's days for the weeks before Christmas and see which designs left the shop first, the Garo and Jaintia pieces or the cloth in a school's dark blue. Those are the lines you bring forward this December. The ones that stayed in the box wait for another season. December's buyers come down from the villages in a few days, and the shelf has one chance to be right.
Bara Bazaar stalls and Garo jewellers: who dresses Meghalaya
Dress in Meghalaya is made by Garo, Khasi and Jaintia hands, and a cloth shop sees the work of each.
- In Shillong, Bara Bazaar (Iewduh) has shops for traditional Khasi materials, and Police Bazaar sells regional apparel and handicrafts.
- West Garo Hills' district site lists makers of tribal-design jewellery, including Seven Cherri, which employs local tribal women, and Amis Jewellery in Tura.
A craft trust that brought its clusters' stock and sales together
Questions Meghalaya cloth and dress shops ask
The choir's second roll is a slightly different shade. How do I note which roll each member's metres came from?
Enter the two rolls as two items, the first dark blue and the second dark blue from the later roll, each with its own count. Each member's bill then names the roll her metres came from, and the choir's page shows who has which, so the treasurer can see where the two shades meet.
A woman takes a dakmanda for the family before Christmas and pays in the new year. How do I enter it?
Make the dakmanda an item with its own rate, bill the piece under her name, and keep the rest on her page until she pays. The page shows the day she took it.
A visitor wants a second Garo or Jaintia shawl like the first, and the slip with the first is lost. Can I find it?
Yes. If the tribe's name is at the front of the item, her first bill carries it, and the same name finds the second shawl on the phone. A lost slip loses nothing.
Jainsem, Ryndia and the emporium near Police Bazaar
Khasi tradition includes the Jainsem, a draped garment for women, and Ryndia, eri silk woven and dyed in villages like Umden.
The Meghalaya Handloom and Handicrafts Development Emporium near Police Bazaar is a one-stop shop for local textiles, known for Jaintia and Garo fabrics.