There Are Pandas, and Then There Are Pandas.
And this isn't either of them! The Pandas we're talking about here, are watches, not bears. And what got me thinking about them (again) was a link posted this morning by @cm.rook who pointed a few of us to the very attractive (and not terribly priced) Yema "Rallygraph" Panda which, in it's most traditional arrangement, looks like the one on the left, but can also be had in the version on the right: The model on the left is a true Panda, while the model on the right is called a reverse Panda. The reason for that distinction is clear--Panda bears, only come in the first arrangement. Now at this point, everyone should be thinking about the most well-know Panda, The Rolex Panda, which is actually a Daytona, and among Rolex Daytonas, the most famous of which is the Paul Newman Daytona, which was famous first, because it was Paul's, and second because it sold at auction for $17.8 million (US Dollars). The story of that auction is well-known so I'll only...
Nov 8, 2019
I think the drops requested in the polls are by and large more what you're talking about and what people would buy: a bunch of yarn, enough to make a specific pattern, but nobody's tying you down with notions and patterns.
The problem with the yarns that have been dropped so far, I think, is that there is a HUGE gulf in how much an enthusiast spends in this hobby. Some people legitimately love to make big acrylic blankets, and that's it. All they want is an assortment of yarnspirations goodies at $5 instead of $8. Some people, though, only really enjoy themselves if they're $100 deep in artisanal materials for their shawlette.
So we get our yarn snobs (and I call them that affectionately, I'm an aspiring snob myself) bummed that everything is Bernat or ColorWul, and we get our basic bitches like myself who look at drops for 10oz of cotton for $50+ and laugh. At least we can all agree that kits coming in small and medium only is absurd.
There's also a bit of a problem with the drops for notions. The discount for the needle and hook sets that have been here so far is barely enough to bring them below Amazon or KnitPicks. Plus, some of the luxury sets have been obviously more something for someone to put on a shelf and hand down to future generations to put on their shelves, rather than something to be used. Rosewood hooks? Cool. Rosewood hooks with rhinestones in the handle? Get out of town.
That said, we have had a few really good drops, like the beautiful handmade yarn bowls. The drop for Patons Grace was also great, I think because it was a) a big enough quantity to accomplish something with one order and b) a good middle of the line yarn, fancy enough to be a splurge for the low-end spenders and nice enough that the snobs like it, too.