The Sewing Machine Shop, Inc.

family history

Campfire Stories

This past weekend I went camping with Dan and Marty for father's day. We got to talking around the fire one night and they told me some incredible stories about the early days of The Sewing Machine Shop.

The Schoenberg family's connection to sewing machines goes back a long time, well before the birth of The Sewing Machine Shop. Up until the Nazi invasion during World War II, Dan and Marty's great-grandparents owned and operated a well known store on Grodzka Street in Krakow. The shop sold fabric for suits, and the business shipped these fine fabrics all over the world. Stypik Schoenberg, Dan and Marty's grandfather, worked for the family business until an arranged marriage had him move across the Pacific Ocean to Argentina, where he ran a factory owned by his new father-in-law.

Stypik had three children. The eldest was Ramon, who grew up and was educated in Switzerland as a mechanical design engineer. Amazingly he spoke 5 languages: English, Spanish, German, Portuguese, and Italian. After his education, Ramon returned to Argentina and took over the factory, which built sewing machine components for Husqvarna AB of Sweden, one of the largest sewing machine manufacturers in the world. He had 5 children, Marty being the oldest son and Dan the youngest. Due to political instability in Argentina, the family was forced to move, ultimately relocating to Richmond, California in 1965. Marty was 7 years old and Dan was 2.

Ramon was hired as engineer for pump company in Berkeley. His wife, Doreen, worked as a school teacher. To make extra money on the side, Ramon worked two days a week fixing sewing machines. Many times he would take Marty along with him. Marty told me he remembers that Ramon would put an old junker machine in front of him and hand him a set of screwdrivers. "Take apart everything you can," Ramon would say. Marty did as was told, disassembling machines into hundreds of little parts, and so began the foundation of a skill set that would serve Marty well for the next 50 years.

After high school, Marty began fixing sewing machines for the Berkeley Sewing Machine Company. Several years later he invested in a van and some tools and started a one-man business that did travelling sewing machine repair, called "Sewing Machine Engineering." Meanwhile, Dan had recently earned his degree in Aeronautical Engineering and was selling Kawasaki motorcycles in Richmond. Marty saw how his youngest brother was a natural salesman, so he recruited Dan to join Sewing Machine Engineering. They rented a storefront in El Sobrante and changed the name of the company to The Sewing Machine Shop. The rest is history: Marty fixed the machines and Dan sold them.

Sitting around the campfire, there were a couple stories that really made me laugh. In particular, there were a couple stories about one of their earliest customers. I'll call him Freddie.

As I mentioned before, Marty had a van he used for travelling sewing machine repair, and it was full of tools. It had the usual type of tools-- screwdrivers, wrenches, nuts, hammer, etc. But it also had tools that are specific to sewing machines-- unique, specialized gauges used to measure critical settings on specific models of machines. Anyway, one day Marty's van was stolen. The police found it a couple days later in the parking lot of a church in El Cerito. The van still worked, but all of his tools were gone. Later that week, Marty got a phone call from this guy Freddie. Freddie did upholstery for a living, and Marty had fixed his industrial machine on multiple occasions in his travelling van. "Hey Marty, I have some tools I am looking to sell. Are you interested in buying them from me?"

So Marty meets up with Freddie and Freddie shows him the tools for sale. Guess what? All of the tools stolen from Marty's van are right in front of him, as clear as day, including all of the unique sewing machine tools that the average person just doesn't stumble upon. "What do you say, Marty? Do you want to buy them from me?" Marty could hardly believe the audacity of this guy. Did he think Marty was that stupid? "Okay Freddie, this is what we're gonna do," Marty says. "You're going to hand me over those tools, and in exchange I won't call the police. Okay?" Freddie agreed to the terms of the deal, and Marty got his tools back.

But that wasn't the last time they heard from Freddie. A couple years later he came into the store to buy a new Consew industrial straight stitch machine. At that time Dan and Marty would do individual payment plans, so Freddie paid his first installment and took the machine home. Not surprisingly, Freddie never followed up to pay the second installment. Or the third. Or the fourth. Dan and Marty had been stiffed for a significant amount of money. That kind of thing stings no matter what, but especially back then when the business was just getting off the ground. However, redemption was just around the corner. A year or so later, Freddie came back into the shop with his machine to get it repaired. He had completely forgot that he had stiffed Dan and Marty out of all that money, and they didn't remind him. Freddie happily handed over his machine to get repaired, and they didn't give it back to him until the machine was paid in full.

All about the Juki J-350 Longarm Quilting Machine

Best Bang For Your Buck

Quilter's Edition

Juki Longarm Quilting Machine

Today I want to tell you about a machine that I have recently began to think of as one of the best bang-for-your-buck machines that we carry, the Juki J-350 Miyabi Longarm Quilting Machine.

What's so great about the Miyabi J-350QVP?

I think the value of this machine lies in two features that work in unison with one another: stitch regulation for free motion sewing and direct drive technology.

The Juki's stitch regulator is a laser sensor built into the needle plate that detects the speed of the quilt moving under the needle and adjusts the speed of stitching to maintain a consistent stitch length. This is an upgrade from the previous version of the machine, where the stitch regulator was external to the head of the machine. Not only was the external stitch regulator less accurate than the new internal stitch regulator, it required that the machine be on a frame opposed to the sitdown table version (seen in the picture above).

With your stitch regulator engaged, all you have to do is input your desired stitch length. Then, when you move the fabric underneath to do free motion, the machine stitches according to your speed. When you stop, the machine stop. It's an incredible technology that has truly changed the sewing landscape for those eager to improve their free motion quilting. However, with the Juki Miyabi J-350, it is made even better with direct drive technology.

Direct drive technology is the future of sewing machines. With direct drive, the upper shaft, which controls movement of the needle, is embedded directly into the motor. This stands in stark contrast to the traditional way that sewing machines are built, where the upper shaft is connected to the motor by a belt. Why is this important? Because the belt is essentially a middle man, so getting rid of the belt is a much more efficient way to run a sewing machine. The needle movement responds directly to the motor, oppose to responding to the less-efficient intermediary belt.

Let's tie these two concepts together.

We like using a stitch regulator for free motion because it helps make our stitch more precise. That is the function of the technology. However, if you combine your stitch regulator with direct drive, your precision increases. Your needle movement will respond in unison with fabric movement more so with direct drive than without it, because there is no intermediary belt to slow down the response. Instead of the the stitch regulator communicating to the motor, the motor communicating to the belt, the belt communicating to the needle-- now the belt is out of the picture, so speed and efficiency increases.

No other manufacturer uses direct drive for their longarm machines. The reason Juki uses it is because it is industrial-grade technology and they are the leading industrial sewing machine manufacturer in the world. In essence, their industrial heritage has seeped into their longarm quilting division.

In addition, no other manufacturer offers a longarm quilting machine equipped with stitch regulation for even close to the same price as the Juki. We are talking thousands and thousands of dollars, and, in some cases, nearly double the price. That's why I say, it is one of the best bang-for-your-buck machines that we carry.

Right now we have our Juki Miyabi J-350 sit-down longarm priced at $6,499. If you want to see how easy and precise free motion quilting can be, please come into the store and sew on our floor model for yourself.

Knee Lift

Hands Free Sewing

Something I often hear thrown around by those looking at new sewing machines is the phrase, "That is too much machine for me." In certain cases this is true. Typically, a $5,000 quilting machine or a $10,000 sewing/embroidery combination machine really is too much machine for a new sewist. That said, often times this phrase is uttered out of intimidation.

The other day I was showing a new quilter a handful of different machines for under $1,000. We arrived at the Baby Lock Brilliant when she said it:

"Oof! That's too much machine for me."

I asked her the reason why she thought that. Was it that the machine was physically larger than the others she has seen? Was it the larger electronic screen? Was it the 250+ stitches to choose from?

"No, it's that thing hanging off the machine."

What thing?

The knee lift.

Today I want to talk a little bit more about the knee lift-- how it is an overlooked feature in the sewing world, and the concept of hands-free sewing.

A lot of people make the mistake of thinking that the knee lift is used as an alternate to the foot pedal to run the machine. This is not the case. The function of the knee lift is to raise/lower the presser foot with your knee instead of your hand. This allows the user to keep her hands on the fabric at all times, because she no longer needs to use her hand to raise the presser foot.

Why is this useful?

Say we are sewing relatively large project with our machine. Handling all that fabric can be difficult, because the weight of the material can cause the fabric to move around and mess up our stitching. It is even more difficult to handle when pivoting around a corner, because we have to take one hand off the fabric in order to raise/lower the presser foot. With the knee lift, this is not a problem. The knee lift acts as a third hand raising/lowering the presser foot, so you can keep your two hands on the fabric, helping you with your quilt and making it easier on your body.

Now, all these sewing machine manufacturers pour lots of resources into their Research and Development teams, whose job it is to discover the needs of the sewist and engineer a product to meet those needs. These R&D teams recognized the usefulness of the knee lift and took it to another level by inventing the hover feature.

The hover feature essentially acts as automatic knee lift. With the hover feature engaged, when you take your foot off the foot pedal and stop sewing, the machine will stop with the needle in the down position. At the same time, the presser foot will raise automatically and hover above the fabric, and will do so until you start sewing again. To see the hover feature in action, take a look at the video below:

For those of us who aim for a precise seam, the hover feature is a dream. Because the presser foot raises immediately at our whim, we can quickly check to visually see our seam whenever we want. For garment sewers, if the seam is on target and looking good, then we can keep on sewing; if it is off target, we can make any minor adjustments needed. For quilters, if we are piecing the top of a quilt, you can use the hover feature to quickly pivot at corners of the quilt block. Because we don't have to lift the presser foot lever manually, we can keep our hands on the fabric, which makes re-adjusting and re-aligning fabric easier than ever before.

The knee lift and hover feature are features you will use every time you sit down and sew. I see many people concerned with how many stitches their machine offers, whether they want the hundreds of different options or not. I would say, in general, people are overly concerned with that kind of stuff. What's I like to remind people to focus on is not stitch #347, which you may use once every few years. Instead, focus on features that you will use every time you sit down to sew. Features like knee lift, larger throat space and automatic needle threader, features that actually make sewing easier, not more complicated.

Metal Housing on Sewing Machines-- Why it is so important

Everyone knows the story of the 3 little pigs...

The first little pig built his house out of straw, and the big bad wolf huffed and puffed and blew the house down.

The second little pig built his house out of twigs, and the big bad wolf huffed and puffed and blew the house down.

But the third little pig built his house out of bricks, and the the big bad wolf huffed and puffed, but he couldn't blow down the house of bricks.

A common misconception that many people have is that modern sewing machines aren't made of metal like sewing machines from the old days. They think modern machines are made of straw and twigs. This is not true. Dan, owner and chief technician of The Sewing Machine Shop, will only carry machines that are designed with metal housing. You could walk through the shop with one of our technicians and have him take apart every machine that we sell, and you would see that every single machine is designed with metal housing.

This principle of metal housing is very important to Dan and to the philosophy of his business. It's understandable why the misconception exists. Many machines have plastic outer shells that are purely cosmetic, that cover the metal housing and make the machine lighter than old machines with metal shells. Also, if you google search "best sewing machine," you will see a bunch of cheap Amazon and Walmart machines with 5 star reviews that are designed without metal housing and are all plastic inside, like cheap toys.

This principle of metal housing is very important to Dan and to the philosophy of his business. It's so important that he called Janome and asked if he could buy just the metal housing to his favorite machine, not even the machine itself, so he could prove this principle to anyone who walks into the store. Janome thought it was a great idea. The other day we received a package in the mail that contained the metal housing of one of Dan's favorite machines, the Janome Continental M7:

The M7 is the brick house sewing machine in the world.

The metal housing that supports all the internal components (needle bar, hook assembly, feed dogs, etc.) is of the highest quality, whether we are talking old school or modern machines. The 13.5 inch throat space is largest in the industry and beloved by quilters. The flatbed design is beloved by garment sewists who have fond memories of learning on industrial clothing machines. It is also the only machine in the home sewing industry equipped with a brushless servo motor, giving it unparalleled power beloved by crafters who sew bags, rope, and other thick materials. And, despite all that capability, the machine still sews smooth because of that gorgeous metal housing.

Long story short, thh M7 is a wonderful tool for creativity-- it is not a cheap plastic toy you throw away after a year or two:

Dan's "Tool vs. Toy" Explanation Video

The Concept of MAP

Have you ever been researching sewing machines online and noticed that all dealerships have the machines priced the same? Have you ever wondered why this is? It is because of something called MAP.

MAP stands for Minimum Advertised Price.

Many sewing machine manufacturers and distributors (Brother, Baby Lock, Bernina, etc.) designate a MAP to each individual machine, and sewing dealerships that sell these machines are not allowed to publish a price below MAP in writing, whether it be on their website or in an email newsletter like this.

For example:

Machine-X has a designated MAP of $500. If you Google search for Machine-X, you should see it listed at $500 by every dealer who carries it.
Dealership-Y carries Machine-X and even though Dealership-Y sells Machine-X in their store for $400, they are not allowed to publish their $400 price anywhere is writing.
If Dealership-Y wants to publish a price for Machine-X, the $500 MAP price is the minimum they can advertise.

This policy is twofold in my opinion:

(1) To make sure profit margins are healthy enough to foster and grow a high quality customer service oriented dealer network that in turn grows the sewing industry as a whole.

(2) To protect smaller dealers from larger operations with resources to undercut prices (think Amazon etc…)

These small family owned specialty shops provide an extremely valuable service to their local sewing community especially in rural and small markets. It’s important to remember that MAP pricing is simply the minimum price that one can advertise at. Dealers can choose to sell the machine for whatever price they want. Otherwise this would be price fixing which I believe is still against the law.

The one aspect of MAP that can be frustrating for both customers and dealerships is that in certain cases the dealer is not allowed to tell you the price of their machines in writing. If you want to inquire about in-store pricing, you must call the dealership for more details.

Technically this means that if Machine-X has a designated MAP of $500, and Dealership-Y sells it in their store for $400, then Dealership-Y is having a SALE on Machine-X. That being the case, here are some of the machine that we currently have on sale:

Bernina

Bernina 770 QE Plus

MAP: $7,999

ON SALE