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Animal Hair on Quilt Tops


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I love cats and was raised with them, although I don't have one now. I advertise my business as a "Smoke-free, Pet-free Environment." I don't mind a stray cat or dog hair here and there. But the last quilt I did was COVERED with cat hair. I was sneezing and blowing by the time I finished it. After I bagged it up, I vacuumed everything in my studio.

How do you handle this? What should I tell this customer? She is in my guild and does nice work.

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Hi Ann. I don't know if I'm in a hard nosed phase, or not.. but....

I would tell her you can't accept any more quilts with animal hairs as it changes your whole line of advertising of being smoke and pet free, plus you seem to be developing an allergy, as you sneezed almost constantly during the quilting.

She may not care, but one of my friends only has to be in a room with a cat, or a cat bed, or where one goes often, and not even close to her. and they literally have to carry her outside and make sure she's breathing well. It can kill.. no need to be responsible for that, nor make excuses to those who think Love me Love my cat.. etc.

RitaR

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Originally posted by Circle Square

I advertise my business as a "Smoke-free, Pet-free Environment.

You are not false advertising here...you are a Smoke Free and Pet free environment....all you can really do is just what you did, vaccum well after you get a quilt like this....wash down all the metal on the machine as cat and dog hair sticks with static electricity.

After that about nothing. Unless you really do want to tell this quilter you will never do another one of her quilts. And that could backfire worse than if you just did a bit of simple cleaning....It's funny how something so simple could get so twisted before long and it would or could become a word of mouth thing that you won't take any quilt unless its perfect....Not a chance I would take.

Also are you a studio where you have quilters come and go or are you picking up the quilts from someplace....if you are a walk-in studio you may find a few that have a reaction to the hair, but I honestly never did as long as I took care of it between quilts. I didn't dwell on it, I didn't gossip about so and so's quilts had a bunch of hair on it...I just took care of the possible mess and went on...if you bring it up there are some that suddenly have an allergic reaction, because of thoughts more than illness. (I have a friend who is not allergic to cats and has 5 dogs of her own, but when one of my cats came into the room when she was at my home she would start to sneeze.... go figure.)

Each quilt was in its own plactic bag until it went on the quilt machine so it never got on others, cleaned up afterwards and all was well.

I have to say I had more of an issue with smoke than animal hair....that would get into the air and sometimes leave a smell that even airfreshner wouldn't help.

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You are the person to ultimately decide how selective you need to be. If you have an allergy to cat/dog hair, no apologies should be necessary when you explain this to your customer. It is a health issue you cannot control. You may ask her to clean the top of pet hair for your heath and then the next top will determine if that is enough. Or you may decide to do a thorough cleaning of her tops outside with a lint roller before taking into your studio. Pets are members of our families and it is tricky going to be "critical" of someone's fur baby--but your health is important too.

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