Interview with Knitter's Pride
As April draws to a close, we'd love to remind you to enter our KAL before the end of the month! We have two wonderful prizes for April's winners: Ravelry's winner will receive a personalised Pom Pom package and the Instagram/TypeForm winner will receive a Knitter's Pride Interchangeable Rose Set (pictured above)!
We were lucky enough to ask Mr. Shirish Jain, Executive Vice President of Knitter's Pride (aka KnitPro), a few questions! We wanted to know all about the origin of KnitPro and their community initiatives in India where the company is based.
Can you tell us and our readers a little bit about yourself?
KnitPro was created from a vision that was nurtured by our founder during the time he spent in USA in 1960s & 1970s. In a reflection of his value system, he was determined to create a just & righteous organisation that espoused the fair treatment of women.
Today, KnitPro is a family-owned enterprise that supports over 1000 employees. KnitPro is proud to be an inclusive company that supports the rights of all workers and contributes to the education of their families.
A strong advocate of women’s fair wage employment, the family-owned company is located in an eco-compliant facility in Jaipur, India.
KnitPro is now a household name among crafters! We’re curious to know about the origin of KnitPro and how the company began.
We launched the knitting needle business in 2006 and within a short span of time we have become the world's largest manufacturer of hand knitting needles, crochet hooks and related accessories. We are equipped with the most modern manufacturing technology and we currently sell close to 4 million needles and crochet hooks every month that are largely targeted towards the premium end of the market.
KnitPro’s products are available in more than 70 countries and the company continues on its path of growth by offering exciting new products and introducing improved product features from time to time.
The Knitter’s Pride brand was introduced in 2011, specifically for US and Canada markets. We started with a handful of products and over the years have grown to offer an unparalleled range to our customers around the world. Marquee products like Dreamz, Zing, Karbonz, Ginger, Cubics, Nova Platina, SmartStix & Waves have been loved by knitters & crocheters alike who find the range innovative and of high quality.
Bayadere from Issue 25 which uses the jogless stripe technique demonstrated in the video below!
We’d love to hear more about your Women Empowerment policy, whereby ‘Knitter’s Pride Pro offers guaranteed employment to all women who approach it for a job’. What are the types of roles offered? Are they broken down into stages of manufacture, for example?
KnitPro is proud of itself on a number of social factors that govern the way in which it carries out its business. First and foremost amongst this is our commitment to provide maximum employment opportunities to women. This is a small contribution that we make to the cause of woman empowerment especially in view of the fact that our factory in Jaipur is surrounded by villages where women in Rajasthan have traditionally been denied the opportunity to earn a livelihood. We make conscious efforts in employing these women to work for us and take many steps including sending out women counsellors to interact with the women in these villages. These counsellors try and convince them to take up employment opportunities that will help them in gaining a respectable stature within their families and the society at large.
In all around 400 women work in the KnitPro factories at both Jaipur & Noida in almost all departments whether it is Production, Packaging, HR, Sales & Marketing, Product Development, Operations etc.
For our readers who aren’t familiar with your Apna School initiative, can you explain a little about this project?
Our business organisation runs a school in a rural area near Greater Noida since the year 2000, where around 900 children from impoverished background are largely offered free education. This is a small step by our organisation to contribute towards the society.
The school was chosen in the beginning of 2000 amongst more than 70 villages that were in the area. The village of Rampur Bangar had no school and the children used to either spend their time helping their family in the agriculture fields or the homes. These children were offered a chance to get educated and many of the children who have passed through the school in the last few years have gone on to study in colleges or have taken up vocational training. Some of these have even found work at KnitPro’s factories!
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Thanks to Mr. Shirish Jain for answering our questions!
We're also delighted to share the tutorial Kathleen from Knitter's Pride made for jogless stripes in the round. This technique is used in Pom Pom patterns such as Bayadere from Issue 25 and Picidae from our brand new Issue 37! 🤩
Picidae from Issue 37