The Secret of Jimmy Beans’ Success

If you’ve been in the online knitting world for a while, you’ve probably heard of Jimmy Beans Wool. An actual yarn store in Nevada, Jimmy Beans is best known as an online marketplace for a wide variety of yarn and supplies and has an annual revenue of more than $7 million.

How did a little yarn store started by a pair of former software engineers become one of the biggest things on the Internet? There are lots of reasons, no doubt, but a big part of it was posting videos on YouTube. As Laura Zander told the New York Times blog You’re the Boss, the company has focused on building its brand since 2007 and used Zappos.com as a model for building their business.

And the company’s YouTube channel has more than 1,400 subscribers and nearly 1.5 million page views, and serves as a great educational resource as well as a way to connect with customers old and new.

Check out the blog for more information on this fun yarn company.

[Photo via the New York Times.]

Many times when I write these posts I will say something like “you can use any yarn you want” or “this would be a great stash-busting project.” That’s just how my mind works. And my stash, too, since I probably have sweater quantity of two or three yarns at most, but tons of singles and odd balls and leftovers.

Blankets are generally a really good way to use up those bits, but in this case, I think you’re going to want to plan it out a bit better.

Looking at photos of the Color Study Blanket from Purl Soho, it looks like it’s made with two yarns held together, and that block in the center is worked with one of each color from the adjoining sides to make a mixed up color.

But that’s not actually how it’s done. This is three separate colors (four, really, with the neutrals in the corners) chosen form a yarn with an expansive palette so they play off each other. The project calls for a worsted weight superwash wool, which is a great choice for a blanket that’s both warm and washable.

This pattern was originally designed by Laura Ferguson and was updated by Hiromi Glover. It is worked in one piece in garter stitch intarsia, which is a great way to learn the intarsia technique if you don’t already know it. It comes in crib or throw sizes.

Despite the introduction to this post, I am going to go ahead and say that, yes, of course you could do this blanket with scraps or odd balls or even just choose five colors that don’t blend together so easily. But I really do love the look of the color play, and I think it would be worth your time to find colors that play well together to get a similar effect.

This pattern is available for free from Purl Soho.

[Photo: Purl Soho]

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