We’re always getting phone calls and e-mails from you, our beautiful, lovely, patient, loyal, good-looking really good looking, wise customers. You offer us many excellent suggestions and ideas (and thank goodness you do because we 
definitely don’t know it all). As much as we can, we try to incorporate these suggestions into how we run our shop. That is why we are pleased to announce the standardization of precuts!
As you know, MSQC carries a very broad selection (and growing) of precut fabrics from a bunch of different fabric providers. The confusing part is that these companies all do the same precut sizes in different quantities. Take charm packs for example; Riley Blake puts one of each print from a fabric line in their charms, so you could get 22 pieces … or 24 pieces …. or 27 pieces … etc (you get the idea!) Moda always puts 42 pieces in their charm packs, even if they have to double or even triple some prints. Some companies include a flat 40 pieces (with some duplicates). And other companies do it other ways. Many of you commented that it was confusing when you watched a tutorial that used a charm pack that included a certain number of squares, and then bought another charm (more suitable to your taste and style) which included a different number of squares. This also made it hard to easily compare prices of charms, to tell if you were getting good value for your money. The same went other precuts as well.
So what we’ve done, as much as we can, is standardize the number of pieces that come in precut fabric bundles. We thank our wonderful fabric providers, most of which have agreed to custom cut for us to make this standardization possible. Here’s what we decided on, with your advice in mind (each precut lists the standard number of pieces it will include):
- Charm Packs (5” x 5” squares) – 42 pieces
- Layer Cakes (10” squares) – 42 pieces
- Jelly Rolls (2.5” strips) – 40 pieces
- Turnovers (6” half-square triangles) – 80 pieces
- Honey Buns (1.5” strips) – 40 pieces
Remember, companies call the exact same precuts by different names (eg – 2.5” x 44” strips can be called jelly rolls, design rolls, rolie polies, roll-ups, stone-strips, etc), so always look for the measurements to ensure you’re getting the correct item!
A few things to note:
- This standardization is only starting to happen with newer lines coming out, so you will still see precuts available with a variance of pieces offered inside (our older inventory).
- Although most companies are on board with this change, not everyone is, so you should still check to see how many pieces you are getting when you buy a precut.
- Since many fabric lines have less prints than the number of pieces included in a precut, many prints are doubled or tripled. We will be as specific as possible in our description to advise on the composition of what is inside.
- Some precuts (like fat quarter bundles and RJR Twice the charms, will still usually carry only one of each print from the line).
In case you’re curious, the reason we chose 42 pieces for the 5” and 10” squares, is because then you can make projects that are 6 x 7 squares, plus with the extra couple of prints, if you don’t like a few (and don’t want to use them in your quilt), you have more remaining squares to work with.
We hope that this change will benefit you, and look forward to implementing even more of your brilliant ideas in the future. Thanks for being the best customers in the world! We couldn’t have come this far without you all 🙂 Happy quilting!