When you buy a new embroidery machine your attention tends, quite rightly, to be concentrated on the thousands of pound you are investing. The object, or objects, of your affection will be the machine and the software. You have looked around, possibly for months, making sure that your careful investigations pay the dividends that you expect. After all to produce the quality and quantity that will take your business forward you must have reliable machinery and software. So, your machine etc. arrives on the appointed day, at the appointed time and you think that you are, to coin a phrase “ready to rock and roll”. Well actually, you’re not!

Before your new machine and software can produce anything approaching embroidery you will need a supply of consumables, and whilst many suppliers will provide a ‘starter pack’ to get you going, this will only suffice for a limited time and you therefore, sooner rather than later, will need a consistent supply.

Although this may seem obvious, it is a fact that consumables tend to get pushed to the back of the consideration queue and very often do not work towards the front until necessity demands it. Ideally you need to be ahead of the game and start considering these essential items at the beginning of the process and not at the end.

Questions about consumables should form part of the overall investigation. For instance you may prefer to use, as far as is possible, a single supplier for everything from machines to scissors. In this case you need to establish that your preferred machine supplier can actually fulfil this need. It could also be that you already have embroidery experience and have a preferred thread. In this case you need to be sure that the machine you are buying will handle that thread. Let us look at a few basics regarding these often forgotten products.

Thread: “It’s all the same” is a phrase that you will often hear and in some respects this is true. All basic embroidery threads are size 40 and are made from either rayon or polyester. Most come on a 1000m and 5000m package. Most have a wide and varied colour range but there are differences and some of them are very important. The one that most people look at first is price but this can be a serious mistake.

Lower priced threads can be as good as any but use caution. I am not saying that you should not consider them but I am saying that you should consider the other variables first. After all there is nothing wrong with saving money but only if the product still lives up to the expectation. In other words investigate quality and supply before you let the price sway you. For instance many of the major manufacturers also supply a “budget” thread. There are other marks that supply quality product at a lower than expected price. Manufacturers such as FALC, Madiera and Ackermann all make for a good starting point but there are numerous others.

The following topics surrounding threads are intended to provide you with a general guide to what you should be asking your potential supplier about.

Raw Material

The quality of the raw material has a major effect on the finished article. Although you may not have any expertise in this, at least asking the question will put the supplier on the spot. If nothing else it will show how much they know about the product they sell and the manufacturer they represent.

Strength

This is also known as the tensile strength and determines how easily the thread will break. Many lower quality threads break very easily and this will increase your down time and decrease your productivity. Whilst you may not understand a technical answer, a simple “does it break easily?” may bring forth a convincing (or otherwise) reply.

Colour Range

This is really one of the less important questions. In recent years the shade range of threads has increased steadily until we have ranges that defy the imagination. Some shade variations are so small that it is difficult to tell them apart. Remember that the bigger the range, the larger the stockholding which somehow has to be paid for. A good variety would be in the upper reached of the 400-450. It is also worth remembering that the wider range of colours that you use will result in a high stock of unused and maybe unusable threads. Never forget that your stock is actually your money.

Package

No, not the box it comes in but the spool it comes on. A few years ago most embroidery thread was supplied on straight cardboard tubes and cones. Although both had been around for years and had become the accepted way, other, more efficient methods were developed and it is these that have in the main taken over today. The favoured package for both sizes is the snap spool. This has a base that prevents the thread from falling onto the machine and trapping, and it also has a ‘flap’ around the bottom that is used to trap the thread when it is taken off of the machine, thus reducing wastage.

Supply

Once you have found the thread you want to use you need to know that it is readily available. Ask not only about the suppliers on-site stockholding but also about the lead time should they run out. How long will it take them to ship in a special order for you? Days, weeks or months?

Laundering

This really is the big one, how well will it wash. You also need to consider which thread to use at this point. Much embroidery these days is for work wear which may suffer regular and severe laundering. If this is the case then it is no good using rayon as this will not withstand this type of punishment. Polyester would be the preferred thread. Even so you must still consider the laundering of the product. Just because polyester should withstand repeated washing it does not mean that it will. All good thread should carry laundering instructions and should have passed the relative tests etc.

There are many other areas that you may want to consider but at the end of the day you should let common sense prevail. The points referred to above are simply a starting point that will help you, but one overriding consideration should always be in mind – ‘don’t buy it just because it is cheap’.

While thread is not the only consumable, it is the most important, but do keep in mind that it is not just on the top of the machine, it is also used underneath. Underthread is generally made from polyester these days. To get the most out of your machine it is better to use a thread that is finer than that on top. This will put more on the bobbin, thereby reducing the amount of times it needs to be refilled. You can also use pre-wound bobbins which work fine, but a word of warning; be wary of pre-wounds without sides. These will work but some machines do not handle them well and it is therefore safer to stick with the ones with cardboard or plastic sides.

We have so far covered thread, but what else is there? The truth is that there is much more to consider, but we will continue with the more important subject of backing and needles.

Backing

Over the years the embroidery market has adopted the use of easy tear backing. Unfortunately market forces originally dictated this trend and the markets have never changed the situation. Easy tear was originally introduced to tidy up the inside of the garment ready for point of sale. Unfortunately it is not the best product for good embroidery. It should be remembered that the reason for using a non-woven backing is to stabilise the flexible area (very often knitwear) to be embroidered. If it tears too easily it can no longer do its job. The fact is that cut away backing will consistently result in better embroidery. The drawback is that the excess must be cut away which adds a job to the embroidering process, and it will also leave a more visible residue. At the end of the day the final decision has to be that of you or your customer.

Needles

Many people seem to make the mistake of thinking that they can use any old needle. After all, it is only a bit of metal so what difference can it make? Well it can make as much difference as the thread. Needles are, in relative terms, the lowest priced consumable you will use. The cost per unit is around 11p and this will last a very long time if used properly. With this in mind it is hard to understand why some people will use a lower priced and inferior needle. Saving pennies could eventually cost pounds. To put the importance of the needle into perspective it is worth considering the fact a piece of thread will pass through the eye of a needle up to 60 times before it is made into a stitch. Just think of the stress that the thread suffers and how much this will increase with inferior metal work. Poor quality needles can and will result in broken threads and poor quality embroidery.

The items covered here will hopefully give you some insight into the importance of consumables. They may be small items which, in the main are inexpensive, but they can make a massive difference to your embroidery and your production. Buy wisely and the benefits will surely follow.

Tony Whitmore is a director of north Nottinghamshire based Your Embroidery Services Ltd and can be contacted on: 01623 863343, www.yesltd.co.uk

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