If you’ve traveled the online quilting world, chances are you’ve used several websites that Dan Purcell and his team of web developers have created.  In the six years they’ve been in business, Websites For Quilters has developed hundreds of websites including thread companies, fabric manufacturers, famous educators, many online fabric stores, brick-and-mortar stores, longarm machine quilters, and pattern designers.

Many ask how Dan got into quilting.  “I just got really lucky,” he says with a smile.  He states he’s not a quilter but has gotten to know enough quilters to appreciate the art very much.  “I’ve had to learn a lot, and I’m still learning,” says Dan.  “I recall a phone conversation with a new client in the early days. We were reviewing her old website’s collection of batiks.  Before that phone call, I had read the word ‘batik’ but never heard it spoken, so I was pronouncing ‘batik’ like ‘batick’ (rhymes with ‘attic’).  I was embarrassed when I learned I had been pronouncing it wrong all along.”

According to Dan, Websites For Quilter’s success has come from a strong emphasis on customer service, client education, experience in software development, and good luck. Walking into Websites For Quilter’s headquarters in St. George, Utah (a town near Zions National Park and home to many famous quilters) reflects the business’ creative spirit.  With a quilt hung in the entry way and being greeted by 13 professional web developers in the office says something about their commitment to helping their clients succeed.

One way Websites For Quilters has helped their clients succeed has been by encouraging their developers to put themselves in their client’s shoes.  For instance, Dan and his wife Emily started an online quilt pattern business three years ago, The Quilt Pattern Shoppe, for the purpose of learning what it’s really like running an online retail business.  “The insights I gained from this experience have been extremely beneficial, and have led to many improvements in our products and services.”

Websites For Quilters has created several other “side businesses” with the intent to help their clients succeed online.  Recently, Websites For Quilters was a finalist in a state-wide entrepreneur competition.  Out of over 100 business concept submissions, they were selected for their idea for a fabric search engine that can locate fabric from a photo uploaded by the user.  Dan presented the concept to a panel of a dozen judges, much like the Shark Tank show on ABC.  One of the judges confessed that his wife, an avid quilter, has tearfully sent him out on an unsuccessful hunt for more of a particular piece of fabric she needed in order to finish a project.  “If only something like this search engine existed... this is an excellent idea,” said the judge.  The concept has since turned into FindMyFabric.com and now has nearly 400,000 quilting-related products in its database, most of them being Websites For Quilter’s client’s products.

Websites For Quilters has also developed QuiltersDailySpecial.com, a daily-deal website promoting online quilting-related businesses; Quilterblogs.com, a site that follows and shows daily snippets from over 1600 quilting-related blogs; and Quiltvertiser.com, an advertising network for quilting-related businesses.

Dan sees a vision where more quilters will be turning to online resources to improve the quilting craft.  “The Internet makes it easier to communicate and share ideas across the world.  My dream is to invent the websites and technology to preserve and improve the art of quilting for generations to come.”

This article was published in the Fall 2011 issue of Quiltposium.com.

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