A
Women Owned Business /
October 2004
A
Stitch in Time
Leslie McGlumphy |
By Pat Lawrence
Leslie McGlumphy learned to sew from her mother
back in grade school. Although she worked in retail after her marriage,
when her second child arrived, she set up shop as a seamstress
in her home. For
fifteen years, she enjoyed sewing for clients and friends, and
making elaborate Halloween costumes for her four children. But,
the first time she saw an embroidery machine, she says, “I
was hooked.”
She spent the next year researching embroidery
machines, learning the capabilities, care and maintenance requirements
of each style. Then came the hard part. “I wanted this
to be something I did on my own. That was important to
me, to have it in my name.” Embroidery machines are expensive,
new ones start at about $60,000.
Designs, fonts and software are extra. “I
bought a used machine on a lease for $28,000.” It went
in a spare bedroom surrounded by tables for hoops and threads.
The manufacturers representative spent a day showing her the basics
but Leslie says, “It takes a lot of time and tears to learn
how to use the machine. Every product, every item requires something
different. I’d never touched a computer and didn’t
know anything about software. It was try, try and try again.”
Determined
to learn, Leslie knew she had to leave home for the knowledge and
expertise she needed. “ I’d never driven
out of state, never spent a night away by myself.” She drove
to Cleveland for two days of software training. “I had to
know how to use the computer because that’s how designs are
sent to the machine.”
That was eight years ago. Last year,
Leslie embroidered over 40,000 caps alone, and thousands of other
items from wedding mementos and reunion T-shirts to pet blankets
and personalized tote bags. The
business grew, moved from the bedroom to the basement and ultimately,
to a freestanding shop. She bought a second, $43.000 machine for
multiple images, and new software.
Leslie had thought her biggest
challenge would be learning how to use the computer. But the winter
after her first purchase, at 42, she was diagnosed with breast
cancer. ”I had an itch
and found something about the size of a quarter. In the mirror
I saw dimpling.” She wouldn’t tell her daughter
or schedule the biopsy until her daughter had finished final exams. “I
didn’t want her distracted.”
A week after Christmas,
Leslie had a mastectomy. “The two
days waiting for the pathology report, to see if the cancer had
spread, were the longest in my life.” Since the cancer occurred
in two places, Leslie was given chemotherapy, and then radiation.
She lost her hair. “It was bad. Fortunately, cancer patients
get a ‘memory eraser’ pill, so you forget a lot of
it.” Back at work almost as soon as she left the hospital,
she developed lymphedema and then, shingles in her arm.
“It was just a very stressful period,” Leslie says. “My
husband was wonderful, but I was scared to death. I wasn’t
prepared to die. My best friend kept reminding me people can die
in accidents or wrecks anytime, no one is really prepared.”
Leslie
never quit working. She set up an embroidery table
at the soccer field and made team logo sweatshirts to generate
business. When she paid off the first machine and started making
money, “I finally bought all new living room furniture.”
Another
friend got her started quilting. When fellow quilters complained
there was no quilting shop in the area, Leslie researched the business. “I
listened, read, and talked to people who were doing it well.” She
bought shelving from downsized hardware stores and $100,000 of
fabric, more than she needed. “That was a hard lesson, but
I’m still learning.”
Half of Wheeling Quilt and Embroidery
is dedicated to quilters’ needs
including an array of fabric choices, specialty threads and scheduled
quilting classes. But quilting is a cool weather pursuit, so, on
the other side, Leslie creates hundreds of embroidered items, from
personalized baby bibs and pet beds to commercial business logos
on jackets and bags. “We take a design in print and turn
it into embroidered artwork on sweaters, shirts, baby blankets,
almost anything. Prices are based on the complexity of the design.”
Leslie
has passed the five-year mark as a cancer survivor and a business
survivor. “Breast cancer changes your life for ever.
The people around you suffer, too. I try to stay creative and energetic.
I have no regrets. But, I think I’m a better person now and
I’m still learning every day.”
For more information,
contact Wheeling Quilt and Embroidery, 35 GC&P Road, Wheeling,
WV, 304-233-8299.
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