A Bunch of Bows - Hair Bow Articles and Resources

Here at A Bunch of Bows, we create hairbows that are made to last! But, as we all know, if hair bows are worn frequently they may need a bit of sprucing up from time to time to keep them looking brand-new. Here are some tips for what you can do at home to keep those pretty hair bows looking bright and brand new!

1) If you have invested in hair bows that have loops that stand up and are "fluffy", it is easy to freshen them up by investing in a bottle of "Stiffen Stuff". You can find this item for about $3.00 at any craft store, or even Wal-Mart. You can fluff up the loops of the hair bow by stuffing them with white tissue paper, and then spraying them with the "Stiffen Stuff". You will need to run hot water over the nozzle of the bottle each time you use it, as it does get clogged up. Once the hair bows have dried, remove the tissue paper and your hair bows will be ready to go once more!

2) Make sure any time you purchase hair bows that they have been fray-checked so that the edges of the ribbon do not fray. Some bow-makers use liquid fray-check on their bows, and it doesn't last for long. Plus, it can discolor the very edge of the ribbon on some colors. The best way to fray check hair bows is to heat-seal them, which is what we do here at A Bunch of Bows. An easy way for you to re-seal the edges of your ribbon at home is to trim the edges of the ribbon with a sharp pair of scissors, and then run the very edge of the ribbon through a flame from a lighter or match. When done properly, the very edge of the ribbon will melt slightly in the flame, and create a hard edge. Of course, you'll need to be very careful and only an adult should do this!

I recently became friends with one of the other moms at my daughter's dance class. She had purchased small hair bows from a boutique several months before that were already frayed and looking quite limp. I spent just a couple of minutes trimming the edges of the ribbons and heat-sealing them, and she couldn't believe how much better they looked with just a little attention.

Remember to ask about fray-checking before you buy any hair bow!

Over the past few years of running a hair bow business with a strong cheer bow customer base, I've learned that you cannot predict what color combinations you will receive orders for. You would think that you could guess the top ten or so most popular combinations, but as I've learned, you cannot!

My own high school colors were black and gold. Pretty soon after venturing into the hair bow business, I learned a quick lesson here... there's a difference between YELLOW-GOLD and GOLD. Yellow-Gold is the color of an uncooked egg yolk, and this is the color most teams want when they say one of their school colors is gold. However, some teams want what we refer to as just gold (or should I say, the ribbon companies refer to it as gold!) This is a mustard, darker shade of gold... some uniform companies refer to it as "Old Gold." Then there are teams that just want to throw you off altogether, like the St. Louis Rams. Can someone tell me what color gold they use? Its too light to be metallic gold, but its not yellow-gold or old gold either.

Then there's Columbia Blue. I learned pretty quickly that the color the ribbon companies refer to as "Capri Blue" is the same as the uniform color Columbia Blue, so we do carry that color if you are looking for Columbia Blue!

Teal was a very popular fashion color in the early 90's... I even drove a teal Mustang for several years! However, its not as popular now, and most of the ribbon companies stopped manufacturing it. This created problems for the schools and teams that use Teal as one of their colors. Fortunately, we have discovered a company that still makes teal ribbon, so we can offer it in some of our cheerleading hair bows styles, and also in our new Spirit Striped Cheer Hair Bow as we've found teal and white striped ribbon. However, of the companies that make the teal ribbon, none of them manufacture it in the smallest size that we use for our korker hair bows, so unfortunately the korkers are not available with teal as a color option.

I've also learned that school colors are sometimes determined by what region of the country you live in. Many times, local school teams will mimic whatever professional team or college team is big in their area. My own high school that I referrred to earlier purposely selected black and gold as their colors because we're in Missouri, and those are the colors of the University of Missouri. We get a lot of business from cheer teams in Pennsylvania, where they refer to Yellow-Gold as "Steelers Gold!"

The color combination that we receive the most orders for is... red, black and white. But whatever the colors you're working with for your school or team, call us and let us create the perfect cheerleader, dance team, or sports team hair bows for you!