About Craftlytics
Craftlytics is an indie project built by pattern designers, for pattern designers — because small business owners in niche industries deserve good software, too.
Meet the team
Carolyn Lisle
Head of communications, customer support, and marketing
Carolyn is our pattern-selling industry expert and the head of communications, customer support, and marketing at Craftlytics.
Carolyn has been designing and selling knitting patterns professionally since 2018. Rapidly approaching the milestone of 100 published patterns, her meticulous and truly unique designs are frequently featured in events and competitions.
A former high school teacher with strong technology skills, she writes the code for her own website and she has been a major contributor to expanding and maintaining the designer pages of Ravelry's Help Wiki.
Having both seen and experienced the frustration of trying to make sense of sales data on her own, she wants Craftlytics to be a resource that helps designers run their businesses with confidence.
Michael Melanson
Principal software developer and head of design and all things technical
Michael is our principal software developer and the head of design and all things technical at Craftlytics.
Michael has been a professional software developer for over 25 years, specializing in business-to-business applications including e-commerce platforms, customer relationship management software, and compliance systems. He has worked for major corporations such as Shopify and Amazon, as well as several startups at various phases, and is currently a staff-level developer responsible for planning and executing large projects in his day job.
After seeing the lack of quality analytics tools available to pattern designers, he used his skills to create a professional-quality platform specifically for them, because small business owners in niche industries deserve good software, too.
Frequently asked questions
Is this a Ravelry competitor?
No, this is not a pattern sales platform. Craftlytics is a service for designers that collects pattern attributes and sales information, then crunches all the data to give sellers useful insights about their business. The system uses Ravelry's API to pull this data from that site, and Michael consulted with Ravelry's lead developer, Cassidy, about various details of that system to ensure the best possible experience for users. So Ravelry is aware of this project and its purpose, and has been a helpful partner in the development process.
Will this work if I don't sell on Ravelry?
Currently, Craftlytics is only integrated with Ravelry. We started with Ravelry because it has a good API as well as extensive, standardized pattern attributes that help us provide designers with useful information about their patterns far beyond just how many of each one they sell and when. Craftlytics was designed with the intention of being able to integrate multiple sales platforms, and we are open to expanding in the future.
What about accessibility?
Michael is a professional software developer who has built many accessibility-compliant systems before Craftlytics. Craftlytics is a responsive application, designed to work on both desktop/laptop and mobile/tablet devices, and it has both a light mode and a dark mode colour scheme.
Is my data secure?
The data for Craftlytics is collected daily via a secure connection to your Ravelry account. We never see your password or the contents of your pattern documents, and you can delete your account at any time. Our data storage is based in Canada, which complies with EU standards for data privacy. See our Privacy Policy
Is this AI?
No, this system is entirely based on what computers are actually good at: crunching large data sets and using algorithms (the math kind, not the social media kind) to give you information about that data that would be hard to figure out on your own. The system does not "guess" things based on what it thinks you want to hear and it has no machine learning "training". Hard data only — no hallucinations! And if you contact support, you'll always talk to a real person, not a chatbot.
What about patterns that aren't knitting or crochet (cross-stitch, sewing, embroidery, etc.)?
We currently support all Ravelry-supported crafts. We plan to expand to a broader range of crafts in the future.
Where are you based?
We are in Ontario, Canada. Oui, on parle français. We do say "eh" unironically and we do say "sorry" when people step on our toes on the subway. Oh, and while we personally like curling more than hockey, we know exactly where they filmed the hockey scenes for Heated Rivalry.
What does this service cost?
$20/month or $200/year (our prices are in Canadian dollars). The purpose of Craftlytics is to help designers make more money, and we hope the insights and data management Craftlytics offers repays the small monthly/annual fee many times over for you as you use it to grow your business, and we hope especially that it saves you time and stress.
Land acknowledgement
Craftlytics is based in Guelph, Ontario. This place we call Guelph has served as traditional lands and a place of refuge for many peoples over time, but more specifically the Attiwonderonk, and the Haudenosaunee. This land is held as the treaty lands and territory with the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation. Guelph lies directly adjacent to the Haldimand Tract and is part of a long-established traditional hunting ground for the Six Nations of the Grand River. Many First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples who have come from across Turtle Island call Guelph home today.