I am clearly doing a terrible job at convincing people to become a FreeSewing patron, because while user growth is ever increasing, our revenue is not. In addition, inflation is very real, meaning that even when revenue remains the same, we’re actually less able to make a difference.
The rise in users also brings additional costs. Simply put, running FreeSewing.org is getting more expensive year by year, while revenue does not keep up, and that’s a trend that has me worried for a while now.
I considered my options for how to deal with this. I could raise prices, but that seems to punish our patrons who are already supporting us, while the vast majority of users does not contribute. Having more patrons is the obvious answer, but I don’t like asking for money and in general seem to be rather bad at this sort of thing.
So, after thinking it over for a while, I have decided to go the other direction. Rather than raise prices, I have removed pricing altogether. FreeSewing is now pay-what-you-want. Yes, you can still have everything for free, but please consider supporting us with whatever amount you can spare.