FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Following are the questions we hear most often from folks who are new to machine embroidery or new to our website. 

Most of these questions have been asked dozens or in some cases even hundreds of times so we know that you may be wondering the same things...

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Q)  Can I really download any of the designs in the ARCHIVES?  

A)  Yes.  The ARCHIVES contain more than 20,000 designs and club members can download any designs they want at any time they are a member.  This makes membership a great bargain.  WE DO NOT CHARGE PER DOWNLOAD.  There is no meter running on your downloads.  Help yourself to all the designs you want.

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Q)  Can I download all the designs at once?  

A)  You are welcome to download all you want to but we do not have a single button that you can click to download everything.  Each set of designs has been uploaded to our servers over the years that we have been in business. There is no way to make one download link that causes all of them to download at one time.  

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Q)  Can I download just the format my machine uses?

A)  On some of our early design sets we separated the download link into different formats.  Eventually we realized that we were spending 40 hours a week creating the different zip files, uploading them to our website, creating download links for each format, etc.  We stopped making separate format download links in 2008 in order to keep expenses low and therefore keep our club dues low.  If you find a set with the old download links for separate formats, by all means choose the set you want.  If the set is newer, all formats will be inside the one zip file.

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Q)  My machine uses ### format.  Will you add that to the downloads?  

A)  No.  Design formats come and go over the years.  If we converted all existing designs to every new format that came along we would spend hundreds of thousands of dollars in labor keeping up with the new formats offered.  Instead, we will show you how to convert designs to the format your machine uses and we will provide our designs in several standard tried-and-true formats that have been around for years and are known to be reliable.

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Q)  What formats are your designs in and why those formats?

A)  We use Baby Lock machines which use the Brother format called ".pes" to do our test sewing.  The ".pes" format is the most common one used by home machines and has been for over a decade.  We convert our designs to HUS which is the basic Husqvarna-Viking format and is the second most popular format used in home machines.  We also provide ".jef" format for Janome and Kenmore customers.  It is the third most popular format for home embroidery.  Those three formats cover more than 80% of all embroidery machines used in homes today. You can easily convert from any of those formats into other home formats with inexpensive software.  

We also provide our design in ".dst" format.  This is a format used by commercial embroidery machines.  The ".dst" format holds "stop commands" but NOT thread colors.  Commercial embroiderers use a color chart to select colors since their machines do not read colors from the embroidery files.

The final format we provide is the ".art" format.  This format is used by some Bernina machines from the early 2000's until about 2010.  The number of people using the ".art" format is actually very small but we made the decision to provide our designs in this format so these people would have the opportunity to become club members and use our designs.  While other brands of machines have software available to convert to their format for free or very low prices, the software required to convert another format to the ".art" format costs about $2,600 today.  Many Bernina machine owners do not buy that software so we have invested in the software and make the conversions for the Bernina owners.  

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Q) I have some artwork I would like to have turned into an embroidery design.  How much do you charge to do this?

A)  This is called "custom digitizing" and it is not what our business is all about.  We make designs that can be used by thousands of people.  Custom design are used by only one person, the person who paid for the customer digitizing to be done.  That's not our business.  You may try searching Google for the phrase "custom digitizing" to find someone who will do that for you.

Typical cost is $100 for custom digitizing an embroidery design.  There are people who will do it cheaper but you may not be happy with the quality of the work they do. The old saying "there's no such thing as free lunch" applies to the cost of having a custom design digitized.

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Q)  I got a design from another digitizer but I'm having problems with sewing it out.  Will you fix it for me?

A)  No.  Contact the digitizer and ask them to fix the problem, but first, run through #1 to #9 above to be sure it is a problem with the design and not with your machine, etc.  Along with other reasons why we won't fix another digitizer's design, there are copyright laws that protect their work.

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Q)  I want a design that a lot of people would use.  Would you digitize it for me?  

A)  Maybe, but probably not in the time-frame you're hoping for.  We DO make a list of designs that people are looking for and use that list to have our artists draw future designs for us.  We would be happy to add your idea to our list for future possible designs, but there is no guarantee if or when the design would be done.  Again, we are not a custom digitizing company and you can search Google for someone to do that for you if you want it done for sure and right away. 

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Q)  My son is a big fan of the Chicago Cubs.  Will you make a Cubs design for me?

A)  NO!  All sports teams from college to professional copyright and trademark their logo.  Using their artwork, OR drawing a similar design, or even using their team name, is probably a violation of Federal Copyright laws and can subject the person who is found guilty (that would be "US")  to fines of up to $250,000 PER INCIDENT!  We are not interested in being sued and penalized for doing this for you.

All brand names, cartoon characters, corporate logos, many landmarks, and many other things you can think of and some you can't imagine are protected by copyright and trademark laws.  We won't create embroidery designs of any of those things including but not limited to.... 

Harley-Davidson, Barbie, Starbucks, Bears, Red Sox, Apple, IBM, BMW, etc etc etc.  These are all logos people have asked us to digitize in the past that we have said no to.  

IF YOU FIND these types of designs for sale on some website, do not buy them if you are in the USA or Canada or any other nation that subscribes to the Berne Convention. 

YOU could be subject to a nasty lawsuit if you are caught.  The websites selling this type of design are usually located in third-world countries where they have bigger problems to deal with than copyright lawsuits.  If the person selling the design is actually located in the USA, then they are inviting a world of problems that you don't want to get involved in. 

THINK FIRST!  Is putting that NASCAR logo on Billy-Bob's hat really worth paying a lawyer $100,000 to defend you from losing your home in a lawsuit?