Dakota Cabin Quilts to the World

Despite the fact that I never could pronounce the town name to the locals’ satisfaction I found Hettinger, ND (population 1,300) an incredibly progressive regional community. Bob Kudrna, the county’s dynamic economic development head showed us around. We saw a new manufacturing plant that has 40 new employees in a new building in the downtown, a $170,000 conversion of the old J. C. Penney store into a 145 seat theater and several interesting locally owned retail stores.

The most compelling stop was when we pulled up in front of Dakota Cabin Quilts (www.dakotacabinquilts.com) on Main Street. The company is owned and run by Laura Walker and her husband Wes Cvach. She is a local physician. He is a rancher.

Laura was a quilter who couldn’t always get exactly the right fabric for her hobby. She also wanted to buy in bigger quantities for better pricing. She and her husband started Dakota Cabin in their home. Ten months ago they set up shop in a building that Hettinger had fixed up in anticipation that someone just like them would occupy it. They are now in the 2400 sf completely remodeled shop with over $100,000 of inventory, which would be way too much inventory for most towns of this size. But they do ¼ of their business over the internet all over the world, ¼ at trade shows and only ½ out of the store. Bus tours have started stopping at their store and Glassworks, a stained glass artisan’s gallery just down the street, because of their uniqueness.

If you go to Hettinger remember to pronounce the GER, like in Ti-GER. I’m practicing the pronunciation because I hope to go back.