New tartan finder - feedback please!

**Nick Fiddes** · 25th August 06, 03:54 AM

Hi everyone

As part of our ongoing effort to make kilt selection as easy and enjoyable for everyone (novice to expert) we've just put online yet another upgraded version of our Tartan Finder:
http://kiltstore.net/materialfinder.html

We believe this to be the largest choice in the world, both showing pretty well every tartan made by every weaving mill out there, plus of course the fact that we can weave to order any non-copyright tartan under the sun in as little as one kilt length.

We'd REALLY appreciate any feedback, as we're so 'close to the woods' we can't always see the problem issues. We think this is our best effort yet in helping people find exactly what they want by name, material, weight, price band, etc. It should be a lot clearer than before, but you tell us. All comments and suggestions welcome, as critical as you like!

You guys have been extremely helpful in the past, and we really appreciate your support, as we hope to support you in return.

By the way, we've two further big upgrades in the pipeline, which this upgrade also lays the groundwork for. So watch this space!

Feedback welcome here, or directly to me to 'nick AT scotwebshops DOT com'. And do feel free to ask, as always, if we can help in any other way.

Thanks!

Nick

**Robin** · 25th August 06, 04:26 AM

Works like clockwork...very nice!

It's great to see all the different versions from the mills.

A neat improvement...very well done

The website is a bit slow, but that's prolly because of the huge database...still acceptable.

**Nick Fiddes** · 25th August 06, 04:49 AM

Thanks Robin - I meant to say that some pages may still be a little slow, but it should all get a bit faster as more pages get 'cached' and our server doesn't have to work quite so hard!

**Prester John** · 25th August 06, 04:55 AM

I like it much better.

One question though...the clergy tartans are all listed as "Clergy Corporate", and I have no idea what that means.

Could you please enlighten me?

I still like that purplish Clergy Green Ancient for a 16 oz tank...

**Nick Fiddes** · 25th August 06, 05:20 AM

Yes, I can explain, though it's a bit technical. The 'Corporate' here is what is known in the Internet business as a 'typo'. :-) We've done a lot of cleaning up of the databases, grouping things into sensible patterns wherever we can -- e.g. combining what different mills variously call 'Antique' or 'Ancient' etc. (which are usually interchangeable) into the same heading, but still giving the mill's name on the tartan's final page. And it was such a huge task there was bound to be the odd mistake I'm afraid, which we'll clear up as soon as we find 'em. Thanks for pointing it out - it'll be fixed forthwith!

**Cawdorian** · 25th August 06, 06:24 AM

Nick,

The Tartan Finder is awesome, it is the most comprehensive I have ever seen.

After looking at it a bit, I would like to propose a new category of tartans, "The Occaision Tartan", the Barbeque Tartan (page 7) would be a good example of this class of tartan.

**phil h** · 25th August 06, 06:36 AM

nice one. there are a lot of tartans I have never seen before.

I prefer to see the tartan swatches and not the artists version.

thanks for the link.

it's also VERY expensive, over $500 for 6 yards for a kilt.

**Nick Fiddes** · 25th August 06, 08:11 AM

Cheers again for the various points...

Re. the missing Grants, I mentioned we've another couple of upgrades on the way. One of these will be to integrate the full list of registered tartans from the Scottish Tartans Authority (of which I am enormously proud to have recently been elected a Governor). As you can perhaps imagine (or, if not, trust me!) this is another massive data manipulation task. But we hope it will now 'slot in' and be as easy to explore as this lot.

I like the idea of an 'occasion tartan' heading. But this will have to wait until we've reconciled our existing categories with the STA's...

And totally agree that the photos of the real thing as woven are far preferable to computer-generated versions, which is why we went down this route from the start and have now photographed thousands. But we can only do that for fabrics that are already made, and the big mills only actually make a small proportion of registered designs. The fact that we can weave a kilt to order from thread counts is rare enough, but until someone commissions one of the rare ones the "artists version" is the best that's possible.

As for the price, I think it's those weave-to-order kilts you're talking about, to which I can only suggest you'll struggle to find other companies even offering this service, let alone for less! :-) Our prices for (well made) kilts from materials available off the shelf are, we believe, as competitive as you'll find anywhere. If not, we'll price match!

Thanks again, all.

**Kid Cossack** · 25th August 06, 08:19 AM

Nick:

A minor issue, but it was kind of difficult to track down the USMC "Leatherneck" tartans. You have to search for US Service tartans first, then the subdirectory will get you there.

Very nice setup, though.

**Nick Fiddes** · 25th August 06, 08:32 AM

Kid Cossack - I was a little confused by your comment at first, because if you key 'Leatherneck' into the special search box within the Tartan Finder itself it seems to me to give quite a clear suggestion. But perhaps were you keying it into the 'main' site search at the top of the page? If so, you're right - that should also find close matches as well as direct matches, as happens within the Tartan Finder itself. So I've asked our techies to fix this too. Far from a 'minor issue', this is exactly the sort of feedback that's helpful, noticing bugs we've not spotted.