Yarn shop scores deal for college kits

Camas Creek Yarn is bursting with collegiate spirit these days, with shop owner Melanie Cross in the end zone as head cheerleader.

The downtown Kalispell yarn shop has gotten the national licensing needed to sell collegiate knitting kits on a wholesale basis for 100 colleges and universities across the country.

In the knitting world, that’s a very big deal.

“We’re the first in the U.S. to ever do this,” Cross said as she displayed a sitting room full of sample scarves and hats produced by a dedicated corps of local knitters in recent weeks. “The reception has been unbelievable.”

Jumping through the hoops required by the Collegiate License Co. to get the rights to sell the kits has been a college education in itself, Cross said. Each school logo from Wisconsin’s Bucky Badger to Boise State’s Bronco had to be designed by Cross into a workable knitting pattern and sent off for approval.

“We’re the only ones with hand-knit patterns,” she said. “I have to design each one to make it knittable.”

Once the patterns were approved, Cross’ mighty force of knitters went to work, producing samples for the trunk show that will allow stores to show the finished products to their customers before sending them on to the next store. If a store orders enough kits it will get its own knitted samples to display next to the kits.

Some patterns were downright tricky, such as the “Flying W” in Wisconsin’s logo. And some portions of logos — like the “O” in the University of Oregon Ducks logo — are owned by Nike.

Cross and her husband and business partner, Andy Hurst, have sunk a sizable amount of money into upfront royalty fees to get the project up and running. Each college gets a royalty each time the school logo is used.

“There’s more money in college logos than in NFL logos,” Cross said.

“Anytime you touch a college logo and you’re going to make money, you have to be licensed,” she said, explaining that sometimes people “skirt the edge of what’s legal.”

If crafters purchase licensed fabric featuring school logos and colors to make products to resell, they, too, must be licensed, Cross pointed out, noting that the Collegiate License Co. actively patrols retail outlets to track down violators.

Even specific school colors have to be sanctioned, such as the orange in the Princeton Tigers’ logo.

“We can truly say we have the school colors,” she said.

Seventeen schools are in the first round of orders, ranging from Yale University in Connecticut to Utah’s Brigham Young University.

Camas Creek Yarn got its feet wet in the collegiate kits two years ago when Cross got the rights to do kits for the University of Montana Grizzlies and Montana State University Bobcats. Cross began developing the patterns while Hurst focused on establishing the licensing and rights to use the college brands.

Four months after that Collegiate License Co. allowed her to pick up one neighboring school and Boise State was added to the mix.

“We had to stay with local licenses for a year,” she said.

Each kit contains the pattern, instructions and enough yarn for a scarf, a beanie or button beanie.

Cross is in tune with a national trend toward made-in-America products for college gear.

“Around the nation, college students are sick of sweat shops making these things,” she said. “There are some real abusers of human rights [in overseas factories]. We wanted to go U.S.-made.”

Cross scouted out the Brown Sheep Co. in Mitchell, Neb., which processes wool from Colorado.

The remaining UM and MSU kits that used yarn from Peruvian wool will be discontinued, she said.

As Cross scans 500 cones of yarn in the basement waiting to be portioned into kits, she acknowledges the mountain of work that has accompanied the project. Her husband has done all the contracts, graphic arts work and other tasks in between working a construction job in the Bakken oil fields near Sidney.

“My mom, bless her heart, folds the patterns and makes the boxes,” Cross said.

Her son, Brian Ek, just started work there, joining Cross’s daughter-in-law Meche Ek. Even Cross’s daughter Erin Ek-Rush, who lives in England, has helped out, running the Facebook page from afar and compiling email addresses.

Cross has high expectations for the collegiate kits and said there’s no turning back from the commitment.

About six months after Cross opened Camas Creek Yarn in 2007 the national recession hit hard in the Flathead and Hurst, a finish carpenter, was out of a job.

“We’ve tried to think of ways to create jobs here,” she said, noting that it’s important to her to use local businesses such as Insty-Prints down the street.

“Total Label is doing our labels and they’ve been great,” she said.

Cross already is developing winter packages of additional kits that will offer mittens, ski hats and Christmas stockings for each college.

“If this goes we’ll keep growing,” she said.

Camas Creek Yarn will have the collegiate kits available on an ongoing basis at the store, 338 Main St. in Kalispell. Call 755-9276.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by email at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.