Introducing: Virtual workshops!

It’s been a long time in coming, but a number of things have come together and it’s finally time to announce that I’m ready to teach virtual workshops!

During the lockdown, I’ve had more time to iron out some details. A week or so ago, I ran a small workshop with a group of friends to test out the instructional technology (this is mostly equipment I already use to teach; I just needed to make sure it would work remotely). A few weeks ago, I posted a survey to get input on various facets of this project. This week, I’ve been reworking large sections of my website to make it easier for people to find and register for workshops. Finally, today, Craftsy/Bluprint announced that it will be closing, which opens a huge hole in the online video workshop ecosystem.

Before I make my announcement, I want to go over the numbers and some other info (scroll to the bottom if you don’t care about statistics). First, I had 184 responses to the survey before I closed it down. I had noticed responses slowing down so I decided to stop the survey at that point. Here’s the breakdown of interest in these workshops, at least from these 184 people:

As you can see (and to my surprise) multi-color double-knitting takes the prize with 124 people interested (about 67% of respondents).

Availability seems to be highest in the evenings and weekend afternoons, regardless of the lockdown, so I’ll stick with those timings for now.

Nearly 75% of respondents said they’d prefer a workshop that was 3 hours long (same as my usual timing) but about 2/3 of those preferred a break midway through. Another 20% said 2 hours would be enough. Time will tell but we’ll start with the 3-hour workshops with a built-in break.

For price: almost 40% of people thought a price point between $40 and $60 would be reasonable, but a little more than 30% wanted between $20 and $40. 12% said $60-80, and the rest gave many, many individual suggestions. Due to the variety of responses, I’ve decided to offer my workshops at a sliding scale starting at $30 (with my Entrelac workshop starting higher, of course). This way, people can choose how much they value the workshop. And if they change their mind (at least in the positive direction) later, I’ve also implemented a tip jar.

Now, to the announcement:

Due to popular demand (see the graph above), I’ve decided to offer my multi-color double-knitting workshop as the inaugural virtual workshop! It’ll be a week from today, Saturday, May 30th, from 2-5pm ET. It’ll be capped at 15 people, so I expect it to sell out quickly. Register now! (…and it’s sold out!)

Some answers to inevitable questions follow:

Why so soon? Because I want to test the entire system sooner rather than later, and because logistics are a little less difficult right now since you don’t need to drive anywhere to get to the workshop.

Why so few people? Because I want to test the entire system — from payment and enrollment to the workshop itself — on a smaller number of people to reduce disappointment if something goes terribly wrong (not that I expect it to). And because I expect that finding 15 people out of 124 (or more) will not be terribly difficult.

Why not the intro first? Frankly, because I contractually can’t. I am teaching at Virtual Vogue Knitting Live in June, and I have a non-compete agreement that means I can’t teach my intro classes (the only ones they’re having me teach) from now-ish until June 29th.

I have not yet decided on a schedule for the other workshops but I will post about those as soon as I can.

Thanks for your continued interest and stay tuned soon for more!