A number of people have said to me, in various places, things like "How sad that you're selling, Purlescence won't be the same without you." Now, I do take this as a compliment. And indeed, in some ways, it is sad. I am sad to be letting go of my baby! I've been working on this shop for more than five years, building it up from nothing, plotting and dreaming over where to take it and how to make it better... It is, as you can imagine, a very personal venture and has a lot of my soul in it. So deciding to sell was hard. Plus, running the shop has kept me in touch with so many lovely people – my customers, my suppliers – who share my joy in knitting and in beautiful things, and while I'm not exactly going to abandon the internet, there's no doubt that my interactions with you all will be different, and probably (in most cases) far fewer.
But I am utterly, completely convinced that this change is a Good Thing (TM) not only for me personally, but for the business, and hence, for my customers. Here's why – the brutal honesty version.
One of the reasons I decided to sell up was that for the past couple of years, I just haven't been able to do justice to Purlescence. There are of course many amazing women who do a spectacular job of running a business while raising a baby, but for me, it's been hard. I've been able to keep things ticking over – purchases get sent out, queries get answered, stock gets ordered – but I felt that wasn't enough. The shop deserves to be thriving, not just surviving, and for that, I needed much more time and energy than my gorgeous baby allowed me. The baby factor meant that I didn't have the concentrated time and mental clarity to plan properly, to promote new products, even to deliver great customer service – in most cases I think I did okay, but every time a difficult baby day prevented me from getting to the post office, well, that was a problem. And while I wasn't able to put my full energy into the shop, I didn't stop dreaming about what I felt Purlescence should be. The discrepancy between those dreams, and the just-good-enough reality, was intensely frustrating.
So when I put Purlescence on the market, I said I was looking for "Someone with a passion like my own for knitting, for handmade goods and customer service, and with the time and energy to build on what I’ve started, and make it even better" – and I meant it. I wasn't at all sure I'd get it, of course. But you know what? I do believe that's exactly what I did get.
The thing is, I don't have to say that. I have no vested interest in puffing up the new owner to you. We have a deal, and once handover is concluded, it's out of my hands (sniff!). If I weren't sure she was going to do a good job, I guess I would be a lot more restrained in my comments. But I have every reason to believe that she will do brilliantly. I've seen evidence of energy and passion in abundance, plus a very solid business mind and customer service ethic. And she just plain gets it.
So when I look ahead a year or so, I think I'm going to be sad, oh yes. I'm going to be gnashing my teeth and tearing my hair. Because Purlescence is going to be going from strength to strength, without me, growing in ways that I'd hoped for and ways I couldn't have imagined on my own, and my ego will be taking a huge bruising.
But that's the kind of sadness that'll make me very happy.
