Peaches & Creme: CottonCloud’s High Prices
I posted previously about how Pisgah Yarn Company was sold to the Canadian firm SpinRite. Now I am posting briefly about something strange I discovered. I have been researching many of the sites that still have some Peaches and Creme yarn still in stock. When I ran across CottonClouds.com, i almost had a heart attack over their prices. For example, at their website, a cone of ombre worsted weight Peaches & Creme is..wait for it…
$19.99.
No, seriously. Here’s a link to prove it. And here’s a link to the plain worsted weight yarn, priced at a staggering $17.95 per cone. These prices are double or more than double the normal prices.
At first I wondered if they were a non-US company and so their high prices reflected extra shipping costs. Nope. Their phone number is American. CottonClouds.com has either always had pricing that is more than double what is normally charged, or they are hoping that desperate crafters will pay their inflated prices. I checked a few of their other yarns to see if they always charged abnormally high prices and guess what? It seems like the only yarn that is priced so high is Peaches and Creme.
Am I saying that a private company shouldn’t be able to charge what they please? Nope. I just think it is ridiculous and a little outrageous to decide to jack up the prices of a discontinued product so high because there is still a loyal customer-base. I probably wouldn’t have even cared if this money-grab hadn’t been so blatant and so greedy.
I have a bad taste in my mouth. I still hope that maybe they always had their prices this high..but I doubt it.
Peaches and Creme: Spinrite, American Cotton & A Sad End
Peaches and Creme has been an enduring part of my knitting life as long as I can remember. It’s one of the few natural fiber yarns that I could get at some place as big box as Walmart and it came in beautiful, bright colors. One of my many weaknesses is that I crave color. Buying fat little skeins of brightly-dyed cotton was the perfect, low-cost way to get this fix. The Mason-Dixon books gave P&C a big boost when they featured this great American yarn in many of their patterns. Who hasn’t knit at least one ballband dishcloth?
Unfortunately, P&C has become another victim of our broken system here in America. I refuse to become political on my crafting. But I think this situation illustrates the kind of crap that happens when profit becomes the number 1 goal of so many people. Peaches and Creme has been bought out by another company and production in the US is being shut down. Before I jump into this, I’ll start a little earlier.
Wal-Mart used to be a big customer of P&C yarns. My guess is that they were probably their largest account. Then, there was a sudden switch. Wal-Mart announced that they were switching some stores to Sugar and Cream yarn, which is produced by the Canadian company Spinrite. They would examine which product sold better and then stay with that product. I immediately knew something was wrong and I figured that this was more about corporate rhetoric than actually testing what product sold better. For whatever reason, probably price, Wal-Mart decided to switch to Sugar and Cream yarns instead. I was unhappy about this mainly because
1. Peaches and Creme is a superior product. It is made from long-staple American grown cotton, not the short staple odds and ends that S&C uses.
2. It comes in many different colors than S&C
3. Every other craft store in the area already carried S&C if I decided I desperately needed it.
Now it’s official. Peaches and Creme was bought by Spinrite, the Canadian company that produces Sugar and Cream. Technically, I should say Pisgah Yarn & Dyeing, which is the name of the now-defunct company.
Link to article about planting closing
Not only is the plant closing, but around 81 workers are out of luck because they have been denied funding from a fund that is supposedly aimed at helping American workers who have been hurt when their company is moved to other countries. Why have they been denied? Because technically, they only get this funding if the original company had moved to Canada. Since Spinrite purchased and moved the company (they are going to use the equipment), these poor unemployeed workers are SOL. Thanks a lot, government.
Link about out of work Pisgah employees
But here’s where it gets really interesting. None of this might have had to happen at all. Apparently, workers believe that the two men running the company chose to sell out so they could get the cash and run. What a charming move. One of the founder’s relatives who worked at the plant has some interesting things to add about this.
I just have to say that I am very sad. I went to the Peaches and Creme website, which is still functioning, and ordered around 20 balls of the very best, affordable cotton there was. A lot of the colors are out of stock, but there are still some available. Fabric.com also has limited available stock and free shipping once you hit $35. I made sure to get extra of my favorite color, Aqua Mist. It seems as if Spinrite just wanted the label and won’t be using any of the beautiful colorways from Pisgah, because here is the recent brochure some people were sent. In fact, it looks like they just slapped new labels onto the same old S&C colors.
‘New’ Peaches and Creme Brochure
I wanted to write this partly because I know a lot of people will be confused about what really happened. I also wanted to write this to express my own sadness about losing a genuinely American yarn company that produced a great product. The Peaches and Creme group on Ravelry is still a wonderful place to visit, so stop by to post your support and love for the original ballband yarn.
The Lumpy Sweater 