Our Family Upholstery Business

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Our first purchase was a good secondhand commercial sewing machine and accessories ($80.00). We've since found that one essential for upholstery work is a narrow left- or right- hinged cording foot ($1.85) to form those decorative ribs you've noticed around the edges of stuffed furniture.

Actually—as we learned later—you can sew heavy fabric on any machine if you spray the seam line with a silicone friction reducer. The product (which also has many other uses) no costs $2.35 per 20-ounce can and is an economy considering the price of a new commercial sewing machine. Nevertheless our older model has turned out to be a very good investment

Furniture padding is often formed into tufts which are held in place by metal buttons covered with upholstery fabric. Accordingly, we bought a Handy Jr. button press and a die ant cutter, with five gross of molds, at a cost of $41.15. (The samc outfit would run $62.70 today.) The price of the molds, die and cutter varies with size. We chose Number 30 buttons be cause they're the most common and can stand in for any others that may originally have been used on a chair or couch.

Fabric can be attached to the frame of a piece with tacks or staples. We bought a used Markwell hand stapler for $7.00 (the electric and air models are too expensive for us). Later, when, the price of Markwell staples rose to $5.00 per thousand, we inquired at the local lumberyard and found we could buy Arrow staples at $2.25 per thousand in the 5/16-inch size w use. To cut expenses, we turned in 4-3/4 books of our Green Stamps for a heavy-duty Arrow staple gun kit. The staples are now running $4.10 per box, but we're still ahead of the game.

We found a tack lifter—one of our most used tools—at the hardware store for $1.40... $1.79 these days. Then we ordered a good No. 160 tack hammer ($2.85 then, $4.35 now) and a wooden webbing stretcher (up from $1.20 to $2.85) from Durotex Supply. We also bought a pair of eight-inch shears, although most shops use the more expensive ten-inch length.

Our first supply order consisted of the following: 1 roll of cotton padding, 1 roll 5/32" welting cord, 1 pound No. 8 tacks, 1 pound No. 14 webbing tacks, 1 roll supertwist nylon button twine, 1 spool No. 18 nylon handstitch thread, 1 roll 1/2" tack strip, 1 roll BFM webbing and 20 yards of black cambric. (A glance at the box with this article will give you an idea of former and current prices.) Burlap comes from the feedstore in the form of sheep wool bags ($2.25 each). Unraveled and opened, they measure 40" X 128". We use King Co. spray glue ($3.50 a can) to stick pieces of foam together.

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