Today we’d like to introduce you to Cindy Clyde.
Hi Cindy, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
CinDWood Crafts is a home business that I started with my family 25 years ago in my garage, first in West Jordan for 5 years and then here in Eagle Mountain for the past 20 years.
We make quality knitting looms for customers around the world who love to knit but find using needles difficult, or just like variety in their knitting tools. The purpose of creating CinDWood is that I wanted to create a home business that my 4 children, and others could help participate in and they could learn good work ethics. I chose the making of knitting looms because I realized that everything made on a loom became a labor of love and service and are then gifted to family, friends, charity organizations, and strangers all over the world.
We program, cut out and sand every loom base we make from mdf boards, and then glue in the pegs one by one. We started with 1 gauge (peg spacing) and 4 different diameter of round looms initially. We created more sizes and shapes and gauges over the years, and at present time offer 8 different gauges or spacing of the pegs, 3 peg sizes and 250 different programmed looms, and more that have been custom made for specific requests from our customers. We even have designed some specific looms to have extra board material in them to allow them to be clamped to a table or craft stand, adapted for customers with limited use of an arm, or weakened by age and arthritis for more stablility and the ability to return to the joy of creating again.
We started as a hobby business, as I worked full time as a nurse, but in 2014 I quit working as a nurse and my sister Kristy came on board to help grow us into an amazing and thriving business. Kristy’s enthusiasm and vision was contagious and she encouraged talented loomers, who were posting amazing patterns, to become designers for us and create e patterns on our looms and sell them on our newly improved website. The designers also graciously contribute to our free pattern collection. They are so amazing.
Within 2 years time we grew from our hobby family business and about $30k in sales a year, to having 5 employees and making $240k in sales each year. We have an ever growing loyal customer base all over the US and in many other countries, plus over 10 designers creating wonderful and fun patterns for clothing, afghans, stuffed toys, lace designs. There is so much more than just the original hats and slippers we started out with.
Originally, a cabinet shop in Draper, Utah cut all of our looms out the first 15 years in business. We would pick them up and then sand them and glue the pegs in the holes. Their cnc machine broke down at one point about 10 years ago and I realized that we were totally dependent on them and had no back up plan. We chose to invested in our own small cnc machine, a huge investment, and learned how to program it, and cut out some of our looms. This paved the way for so much more growth for us, and ee now cut every loom to order. I still buy my boards from Alpine Cabinets, CinDwood would never have happened without them from the beginning.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
No, it has not all been smooth sailing, but it has been a great journey.
The idea started out as a 4-H project for the county fair. My daughter won a blue ribbon for the loom she made out of scrap lumber, and the hat she made on it.
I decided to have a few sets cut out at a local cabinet shop out of mdf-medium density fiber board. I made 4 sets of 4 sizes of loom rings, a set for my mom, one for me and two extra sets that I took into a local hobby and craft store to try to sell on consignment.
The store manager asked if I would consider making more and selling them wholesale to put in their store. Not knowing any better, I said yes and the next day he called ordering 200 looms for the 5 stores the company had. I wasn’t even a business yet. It took us a month to get organized, get a city license, a company name, order supplies and start CinDWood Crafts.
The first year, we only made looms for that group of stores, we had to groove every wooden peg initially with a router, jig and template and sand them all and glue them into the holes, my children began to hate wooden pegs by the end of that year.. It would take 3-4 weeks to finish orders and deliver them and the next week they would order more.
In searching for a more time and cost effective alternative, I found a company in SLC that made custom injection 6molds to put in their injection mold machines to mass produce. They would make me a peg mold for $5000. That was a huge obstacle for us at that time. We talked as a family and our children all volunteered $1000 each from their savings account, a gift from their grandfather when he passed away, just to not have to work on another wooden peg, ever.
The mold was created and the injection mold company was able to shoot us 1600 pegs in the first run. We were able to glue in the pegs for 40 looms in 2 man hours. Previously we managed 12 looms in 16 man hours. Life was good again.
The hobby store ran into financial issues and had to close down their stores, as that occurred, we decided to start our own online store and cater to the individual customer at a retail price, giving us more capital and budget.
We enlisted a group of college students to create our first website store and increased inventory with the new nylon injection molded pegs.
Expanding to more loom choices and custom looms could only occur if we invested in a machine of our own. It was a huge learning curve for my daughter and I, but it opened up a whole new avenue for designing looms and so many more items besides looms, like rocking chairs and games.
Another challenge was the injection mold company that made our pegs for us burned down around Christmas 2015. Our molds were luckily in a storage room not in the machining room at the time, so were only smoke damaged. Finding a new company who had machines that our molds would fit in was a miracle, and they have kept us running since, and they later created brand new and improved molds that will last even longer..
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I worked for 30 years as a Registered Nurse in the urgent care setting until 2015 when my craft business grew big enough to need my fulltime attention. Communication, patience and compassion is needed in both positions.
I have been the head of CinDWood Crafts for the whole 25 years. I have learned to program looms on our cnc machine, router and sand the looms, glue in pegs. I can customize a box to fit odd orders fast.
I am known for giving great customer service in problem solving, assisting in choosing what looms will work for the client best. I answer the phone personally 95% of the time.
Our team works well together, and I am grateful for my employees and designers.
We pride ourselves on our customer service. We try to resolve any issues as quickly as we can, and I have many long time return customers who have become loyal friends over the years.
What would you say have been one of the most important lessons you’ve learned?
Creating a safe, and positive work environment for yourself and your employees is so important. Respect and feeling valued as an asset must go both ways. You can’t demand respect, you earn it by your actions and attitude as a leader and as an employee worker. Mistakes will happen, learn from them, not condemned by them.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.cindwoodlooms.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/cindwoodcrafts
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/knittinglooms
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/cindwoodcrafts
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@cindwoodlooms
- Other: https://pintrest.com/cindwoodlooms
