Billing for your garment and cloth shop in Uttarakhand
The sweater in its size, the shawl from the weaver and the family's udhaar, all on one bill.
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From each hand-woven shawl to the one rate set for the February sweaters
The cooperative told from your list which of its shawls left
Put the cooperative's or the weaver's name in the shawl's item. At the end of the season the list for one name shows how many of its shawls left, and you can tell the cooperative which of its weaves sold, in its own words, before it weaves the next lot.
A flaw agreed with the weaver, and the perfect shawls left true
A small flaw in a hand-woven shawl is something you agree on with the weaver or show the buyer, and the rate is the one you agreed. The shawl goes on its own line at that rate, and the perfect shawls on the wall stay as true on the phone as they are on the rack.
In February the small sweaters at the back get their lower rate once
By February it is the small sweaters that sit at the back, because the mediums and larges went in the first cold. Set the lower rate on those small ones once. Each bill after that uses it, and two customers holding the same sweater pay the same.
Almora shawls, Pithoragarh woollens and Tehri jute: what the hills make that a cloth shop sells
The hills make a good part of what a cloth shop sells. Here is what three districts are known for.
- Almora town makes copperware and woolen goods like shawls and carpets, and a Ministry of Textiles marketing and service centre operates there. A cloth shop in the hills sees such goods on its own shelves in the cold weeks.
- Jauljibi and Thal fairs in Pithoragarh district are mainly trade fairs, and woollen goods and Doka baskets are local crafts.
- Tehri Garhwal's district handicraft page lists jute products made by women's self-help groups, such as braided shopping bags, door mats, fruit baskets and yoga slippers.
The first cold morning, the stall by the road and the February shelf
The first cold morning, and the sweaters are in the wrong sizes
The first cold morning sends half the town to the shop for sweaters, caps and mufflers. The medium goes first, the large next, and the small ones stay on the shelf. You find out what is missing when a customer asks, and by then the next cold week is a day away and the supplier is far. A shopkeeper who has lived through many winters knows roughly when the cold comes, and still misses it by a week.
The stall by the road and the shop in town share one stock, in your head
You keep a small stall of caps and mufflers by the hill road for the visitors, and the shop in town for the families. When a muffler goes at the stall, nobody tells the shop, and a family is promised one that is no longer there. The stock of both lives in one head, and the head is at the stall.
February, and the unsold sweaters sit at the back of the shelf
By February the cold is going and the sweaters that did not sell sit at the back of the shelf. The helper marks a lower price on one, forgets the others, and a customer holding two of the same sweater is charged two different rates.
Tools for a shop where the winter stock is bought before the winter comes
Low stock warnings
Shows the medium and large sweaters running out, while the next order can still reach you before the cold week.
Your own online shop
A page of your shawls and sweaters, sent on WhatsApp to a family in a far village, so it can choose before the trip to town.
Daily reports
The first cold week of this year read beside the same week of last year, so the next order starts from what sold.
Craft stores of an artisan trust that put their stock on one list
Questions Uttarakhand garment shops ask about sizes, woollens and exchanges
A family asks me to keep a muffler for it, and my stall by the road may sell it first. How do I hold it?
Make the bill for the muffler in the family's name with whatever it has paid, and put the muffler in a bag with the family's name on it. Once it is billed it leaves the count, so neither the stall nor the shop promises it to anyone else.
Every hand-woven shawl is a little different. Can each have its own price?
Yes. Make each shawl an item with its own rate and a count of one. When it is sold it comes off the list, and the next shawl keeps its own rate.
On the first cold morning the medium and large sweaters go first. How do I see what is left?
Open the sweater items and look at the mediums and larges first. They show what is left on the rack and what is gone, so a customer at the door is told the truth in a minute, while the small and extra-large sizes can wait.
The weavers and cooperatives behind Uttarakhand's woollens
The state Cooperative Department lists 47 handloom, textile and weavers cooperatives and 8 handicraft cooperatives in Uttarakhand. A shop that buys woollens from a cooperative is one of many shops that buy this way, and it can name the cooperative a shawl came from.
Bhotia weavers dominate Uttarakhand's hand-weaving, making socks, caps, scarves, sweaters, mufflers and shawls. Those are the pieces a hill shop sells in the cold weeks, in sizes and colours that need a count of their own.