New Yarn Ideas

Recently, Kelly and I have been talking about adding a new yarn (or two) to our collection. We both feel strongly about the importance of treating our environment well. In our personal lives we recycle and compost and avoid wasteful purchasing. I dream about one day having solar panels (somehow I doubt my apartment manager would agree to that, though). And we try to make The Unique Sheep as eco-friendly as possible, too. Most of our yarns are milled in the US, which makes us feel more comfortable about labor rights issues, keeps our money in the country and cuts down on transportation (i.e. using less gas). We reuse the water we pre-soak our yarn in for dyeing (halving the amount of water required in the dyeing process). Our skein winders are human-powered, not electric. And we feel very comfortable with the eco-impact of our dyes-- very little excess dye gets dumped down the drains, especially with our wool yarns. BUT, our yarns themselves are not organic. The superwashing process uses chemicals that makes it impossible (to my knowledge) to have a superwash yarn that is organic. And superwash yarns are very popular, for good reason- they are easier to care for than regular wool.  So this brings us back to the idea of new yarns. The yarns we are considering are all organic wool in worsted, sport and fingering weight. We can add all three, or just one or two. These yarns would all need to be handwashed, of course, but could also be used for felting. When we have a new yarn milled for us we have to commit to a LOT of yarn, so its a big decision for us to make. And thats why I'm letting you know what we are thinking about. Is this something that you'd be interested in? To make room, we are also thinking of getting rid of our Leili yarn. We love Leili, but it just doesn't seem to be selling as well as the other yarns. 

So what do you think?