Custom fiber mill: how teams run it

The idea

Small custom mills are in demand, and the wait shows it: farms queue for months, sometimes more than a year, to have their fleeces washed, carded and spun. The work still runs on a paper form tucked into each bag, a notebook of who's next and a phone that rings with "when will mine start?". A bag whose label falls off is a fleece nobody can name, and a line nobody can see invites quiet favors.

The method is simple. Every shipment from a farm is one Order, and orders wait their turn in one line, first come, first served, measured in pounds. Every bag is a Fleece with a number from the moment it's weighed. An order splits into Batches, one per product, and a batch never holds two customers' fiber. The Mill manager keeps the line moving and says honestly when each order should start; Operators run the batches through the machines, stage by stage.

In any work tool, this becomes five kinds of linked records: farms and their orders, whose workflow runs from Expected to Returned; batches that move machine by machine from Waiting to Done; the fleeces inside them; and the mill's price list. People live on a board of batches by machine and a line of orders by arrival; a custom view adds up the pounds ahead of every order and turns them into a start month, and a rule marks an order ready when its last batch is done. It's the mill's order book and production line in one, not its accounting.

How it runs

Follow one order, Hillside spring clip, from the form to the box going home.

The farm books in. After shearing, a farm fills the Order form: the farm and its clip, its Contact, how many Bags it's sending, its Return, Ship or Pick up, and what it wants, fleece by fleece, in its own words. Hillside wants its two white fleeces blended into worsted yarn and its grey one made into roving. The form arrives as an order in Expected: the fiber is on its way. Intake, the person who receives bags and talks to farms, links the order to the farm's Customer record, with its email, phone and return address, or adds the farm the first time.
The bags arrive. Three bags come in the mail, a form inside each. Intake weighs each bag and logs it as a fleece named after the animal it came from. Each fleece gets its Tag number the moment it's logged, and intake writes the number on the bag before the bag leaves the scale. The fleece also records its Fiber, its Color and its Raw weight in pounds: Daisy is tag 1046 at 7.2 pounds, Clover 1047 at 6.8, Pepper 1048 at 8.1. Then intake splits the order into batches, one per product: Hillside worsted holds Daisy and Clover, and Hillside roving holds Pepper. Each batch gets a Product from the mill's price list, which sets its Rate per pound and its Minimum weight. Intake takes the deposit, ticks Deposit paid and moves the order to In line. The Received rule sets its Received on date, and from that day the order counts its Days waiting.
Intake checks the fiber. Every fleece gets a Condition: Good, or a reason to call the farm, such as Needs skirting, with the dirty edges still on, Heavy vegetable matter, Tender, where the fiber snaps when tugged, or Too short. Clover is full of hay. Intake moves the order to On hold and asks the farm whether to skirt it for a fee or send it back. A held order keeps its place in line, because Received dates an order only the first time. Hillside says skirt it; intake notes the answer in the order's comments and moves it back to In line. A batch lighter than its product's minimum shows red as Under minimum, and intake asks the farm to add a fleece or pick another product. A fleece the mill can't use at all is marked Rejected: it stays with its batch, so it goes home in the same box, and it's left out of every weight.
Every Monday, the line moves. The mill manager opens Queue forecast, a custom view of every waiting order in the order it arrived, with the pounds ahead of it and the month its turn should come at the mill's pace. The mill manager moves the orders at the front to In production; the Started rule sets their Started on, which stops their days waiting. The forecast saves each waiting order's Estimated start, and intake tells the farms that ask. Hillside is ninth in line, 410 pounds back, and should start in July: a month, never a day.
The batches run. Operators take each batch through the machines, one state per stage: Waiting, Washing, Picking, where the fiber is opened up, Carding, where it's combed into a web, Spinning and Finishing. Each batch has one Operator, and Production shows every batch at its machine. Right after washing, the operator weighs the batch's Washed weight, which its price runs on. Hillside roving skips Spinning.
A batch is finished. At Finishing, the operator skeins the yarn, sets its twist, counts the Skeins, weighs the Finished weight and moves the batch to Done. The Batch done rule sets its Done on. The batch now shows its Yield, the share of its raw weight that came back as fiber, from 0 to 100; washing alone takes a good part of it, so farms like to see the number. When a batch can't be made, say the fiber is too short to spin, the operator moves it to Cancelled with a comment. Intake calls the farm, and usually a new batch with another product takes its place.
The order is ready. When Hillside's last batch is done, the Order ready rule moves the order to Ready. Its Price is the sum of its batches' prices, each batch's washed weight at its product's rate. Intake bills it from the mill's accounting, ticks Paid when the money is in, and ships the box or waits for the farm to pick it up. Intake pastes the Tracking number and moves the order to Returned.
Or it stops early. A farm that changes its mind before its turn has its order moved to Cancelled by intake, and its fiber goes back unwashed. Next spring Hillside books again, and its customer record shows every order with its weights and yields, so the farm can see how this clip compares.

What people look at

Every morning — Production: every unfinished batch at its machine, a column per stage, red when a batch is under its product's minimum and grey when its order is on hold. What's running, and what comes next. Each operator also opens My batches.
Every Monday — Queue forecast, a custom view: the line in arrival order, the pounds ahead of each order and the month it should start. The mill manager pulls the next orders from the front. If your tool can't draw it, Queue does the job as a plain grid, with Estimated start typed by the mill manager.
When bags arrive — Order board: every open order in its state, Expected for what's in the mail and Ready for what can go home, red when ready but unpaid. Fleece log: every bag by tag number, for "whose is bag 1047?".
Any time — Customers for every farm with its orders and their yields; the Order form for farms; the Wait time report for how long orders waited before starting, month by month; and the Pounds out report for what the mill produced, by product.
How to run the custom fiber mill — this process on one screen, kept where the team works.

The rules

These are all the automations; everything else in the story is done by people.

Received: when an order moves to In line and has no Received on yet, its Received on is set to today. An order back from On hold keeps its date, so it keeps its place.
Started: when an order moves to In production and has no Started on yet, its Started on is set to today.
Batch done: when a batch moves to Done, its Done on is set to today.
Order ready: when a batch moves to Done and every batch of its order is Done or Cancelled, the order moves to Ready.

No automations in your tool? Then a person does each of these at the same moment, and the promises they keep below become practices.

What must stay true

Whatever anyone edits, adapts or corrects, these hold; each says what keeps it so.

★ A batch holds one customer's fiber. Every fleece belongs to one batch and every batch to one order, so two customers' fiber never share a run. Kept by the Batch relation on Fleece and the Order relation on Batch; cleaning the machines between batches is a practice.
★ Every bag is known from the moment it's weighed. Its fleece gets a tag number as soon as it's logged, and the number goes on the bag before the bag leaves the scale. Kept by the Tag number; writing it on the bag is a practice.
★ The line is first come, first served, and a hold doesn't cost a farm its place. Kept by Received, which dates an order only the first time it joins the line; shown on Queue forecast and Queue, both in Received on order. Starting an order out of turn is the mill manager's call, explained in the order's comments; a practice.
Nothing runs on held fiber: an order On hold waits for the farm's answer, and its batches stay Waiting. Shown on Production, where a held order's batches are grey; keeping them off the machines is a practice.
An order is Ready only when every batch of it is done or cancelled. Kept by Order ready; an order whose last batch is cancelled rather than done is moved by the mill manager.
Price follows weight: a batch costs its washed weight at its product's rate, and an order costs the sum of its batches, cancelled ones aside. Kept by the Price formulas; the price list changes between seasons, never under an order already billed, which is a practice.
Fiber goes home only once it's paid for. Shown on Order board, where a Ready order not yet paid is red; a practice.

Making it yours

Decide these before you set it up; each has a default if you shrug.

Question	Default	If not the default
Which stages does your fiber go through?	Washing, picking, carding, spinning, finishing	Batches follow your own machines: add Dehairing after Picking for alpaca and cashmere, Drafting after Carding for pin drafted roving, or Felting for felt, and drop the stages you don't run
Do farms reserve a place before they ship?	No: the line forms as fiber arrives	Farms book ahead, often with a deposit: add a Reserved state before Expected, and let Received date an order when it's reserved, so the line forms by reservation instead
Do you also make your own yarn to sell?	No	Your own runs wait in the same line: add the mill as a customer and run them as its orders; stock and sales stay in your shop
Do you already keep customers in your tool or your accounting?	—	Orders link to the customers you already keep: point the Customer relation on Order at them instead of creating Customer

One or two people: drop Operator and My batches; Production is enough when everyone runs every machine.
Other words: "Clip" or "Job" for order, "Lot" for batch, "Bag" for fleece: rename freely. Kilograms work as well as pounds; pick one unit and keep it everywhere, the price list included.
Pooled lots: when several small farms want their fiber run together, the pool is a customer of its own with its own order, and the farms agree beforehand how the yarn is shared. The batch still holds one customer's fiber.
Dyeing: once dyeing is a regular service, add a Dyeing stage after Finishing and a Dye color field on Batch for the color the farm chose.
A page for farms: farms that could see their own orders, states and estimated starts would call less. It needs a way to show each farm only its own orders, which most tools set up apart from the rest.
What teams add once it runs: a reminder for orders on hold more than a week, a skein label template, a report of yield by fiber, and a stage clock that shows where batches wait. Each is small, and left out so the first season stays simple.
Pushed too far: a start month promised as a date becomes a broken promise every time a machine stops. Say a month, and let the line, not the calendar, decide who's next.

Details for building

What follows is what the process is built from, in words any tool can follow; the story above is enough to run it.

Each kind of record (Order, Batch, Fleece) is a database or a table, depending on the tool, or a tab in a spreadsheet. A relation links two kinds; its inverse is the name it has on the other side. A state is a step in a workflow, and a finished state ends it. A rule is an automation, a button is an automation someone presses, and a formula is a field the tool computes. A nested view shows each record's children beneath it; where a tool can't nest, group the children by their parent instead.

A customer sends orders, and an order splits into batches, one per product. A batch holds the fleeces that go into it and takes one product from the price list. A fleece belongs to one batch and a batch to one order: that is what keeps two customers' fiber apart.

erDiagram
    Customer |o--o{ Order : sends
    Order ||--o{ Batch : "splits into"
    Batch ||--o{ Fleece : holds
    Product |o--o{ Batch : prices

Order

One record per shipment from a farm, from the form to the box going home. Its name is the farm and the clip ("Hillside spring clip"). The description holds what the farm asked for, fleece by fleece, as written on the form. Comments on: holds and their answers go there.

Field	Type	Why
Customer	relation, many-to-one → Customer; inverse Orders	The farm; linked by intake when the order arrives
Contact	text	How to reach the farm, as written on the Order form; intake copies it onto the customer the first time
Bags	integer	How many bags the farm is sending; intake checks the count on arrival
Return	single select: Ship, Pick up; default Ship	How the finished fiber goes home; on Order board
Received on	date	Set by Received the first time the order joins the line; the line's order and Days waiting run on it
Started on	date	Set by Started; ends Days waiting, and the Wait time report counts by it
Estimated start	date	The first day of the month the order should start; written by Queue forecast or typed by the mill manager; what intake tells the farm
Deposit paid	checkbox	Ticked by intake when the farm pays its deposit; on Queue
Paid	checkbox	Ticked by intake when the bill is paid; fiber goes home only once it is
Tracking number	text	Pasted by intake when the box ships, for "where is my box?"

States: Expected → In line → On hold → In production → Ready → Returned (finished) · Cancelled (finished). Default: Expected. On hold can come from In line or In production, and the order goes back to where it was. Source of truth: Received on, set once by Received; the line sorts by it, so a date typed by hand moves the order in line.

Formulas:

Raw weight — the sum of the Raw weight of its batches that aren't Cancelled, a decimal with one decimal place, 0 with no batches; on Queue and Order board, and read by Queue forecast.
Days waiting — days from Received on to Started on, or to today when the order hasn't started, a whole number, 0 with no Received on; on Queue, and averaged by the Wait time report.
All batches done — yes when the order has at least one batch and every batch is Done or Cancelled, no otherwise; Order ready fires on it.
Price — the sum of the Price of its batches that aren't Cancelled, money, 0 with no batches; on Order board and Customers, and what intake bills.

Batch

One product made from one order's fiber. Its name is the farm and the product ("Hillside worsted"). The description holds the farm's spec: the blend, the yarn weight and ply, anything to add. Comments on.

Field	Type	Why
Order	relation, many-to-one → Order; inverse Batches	Every batch belongs to one order, so to one customer
Product	relation, many-to-one → Product; inverse Batches	What it becomes, from the price list; its rate and minimum come from there
Operator	person; inverse Operated batches	Who runs it through the machines; My batches
Washed weight	decimal, pounds, one decimal place	Weighed by the operator right after washing; Price runs on it
Finished weight	decimal, pounds, one decimal place	Weighed at finishing; Yield and the Pounds out report run on it
Skeins	integer	How many skeins, bags or bumps came out; counted by the operator at finishing, for packing
Done on	date	Set by Batch done; the Pounds out report counts by it

States: Waiting → Washing → Picking → Carding → Spinning → Finishing → Done (finished) · Cancelled (finished). Default: Waiting. Roving and batts skip Spinning.

Formulas:

Raw weight — the sum of the Raw weight of its fleeces whose Condition isn't Rejected, a decimal with one decimal place, 0 with none; on Production, and read by the order's Raw weight, Under minimum and Yield.
Price — Washed weight times its product's Rate per pound, money, 0 when either is missing; summed by the order's Price.
Yield — Finished weight as a share of Raw weight, a whole number from 0 to 100, 0 when either is missing; on Customers, under each order.
Under minimum — yes when Raw weight is above 0 and below its product's Minimum weight, no otherwise and no with no product; red on Production.

Fleece

One bag as it arrives, usually one animal's fleece. Its name is the animal, as the farm wrote it ("Daisy"). No description. Comments on, for anything intake notices.

Field	Type	Why
Tag number	integer, numbered automatically in the order fleeces are logged	Written on the bag at the scale; how anyone finds a bag on Fleece log
Batch	relation, many-to-one → Batch; inverse Fleeces	Which batch it goes into, and through it which order
Fiber	single select: Wool, Alpaca, Llama, Mohair, Other; default Wool	What it's washed and carded as; on Fleece log
Color	single select: White, Grey, Brown, Black, Mixed; no default	Its natural color, set by intake; a common choice is running light fiber before dark on a shared machine
Raw weight	decimal, pounds, one decimal place	Weighed by intake on arrival; the line, the minimum and the yield run on it
Condition	single select: Good, Needs skirting, Heavy vegetable matter, Tender, Too short, Rejected; default Good	Intake's check on arrival; anything but Good is a reason to call the farm, and Rejected fiber is left out of every weight

No states: a fleece moves with its batch.

Product

One line of the mill's price list: what a batch can become ("2 ply worsted yarn", "Roving", "Batts"). The description holds the spec: yarn weight, ply, skein size. Fields: Rate per pound (money; the price per pound of washed fiber, which Price on Batch uses; pricing on washed weight is a common choice, since what washes out varies from fleece to fleece); Minimum weight (decimal, raw pounds; below it a batch shows Under minimum). No states.

Customer

One record per farm or fiber artist that sends fiber. The description holds notes: breeds, preferences, what they asked for last time. Comments on. Fields: Email (email); Phone (phone); Address (text; where boxes go home). No states.

Views

View	Type	Of	Grouping	Shows	Filter	Sort
Production	board	Batch	columns State	Order, Product, Operator, Raw weight, Washed weight; red when Under minimum, grey when its order is On hold	State is not Done or Cancelled
My batches	list	Batch		Order, Product, State, Washed weight	Operator is me; State is not Done or Cancelled	State
Queue	grid	Order		Customer, Received on, Raw weight, Days waiting, Estimated start, Deposit paid, State; grey when On hold	State is In line or On hold	Received on asc
Order board	board	Order	columns State	Customer, Raw weight, Estimated start, Price, Paid, Return; red when Ready and not Paid	State is not Returned or Cancelled
Fleece log	grid	Fleece		Tag number, Batch, Fiber, Color, Raw weight, Condition		Tag number desc
Customers	grid	Customer	Orders nested: State, Received on, Raw weight, Price; under each order, Batches nested: Product, Finished weight, Yield	Email, Phone		Name asc
Order form	form	Order		Name (required), Contact (required), Bags (required), Return (default: Ship), Description
How to run the custom fiber mill	document			the process on one screen, linking to this recipe

App

Queue forecast, a page of its own. It lists every order In line or On hold by Received on, with its raw weight, as a bar on a month axis that starts the week its turn should come. The mill manager sets the pace, pounds per week, at the top, and the app keeps it. An order's turn comes once the mill has run, at that pace, the unfinished batches of every order In production and every order ahead of it in the line. Held orders keep their row, in grey. A save button writes each order's Estimated start as the first day of its month; clicking a row opens the order. With nothing waiting it shows "The line is empty." Reads: Order Name, Customer, Received on, Raw weight, Days waiting, State; Batch Raw weight, State, Order. Writes: Order Estimated start. Fallback: the Queue grid.

Reports

Wait time — source Order, current, only orders with a Started on: a bar of the average Days waiting by month of Started on.

Pounds out — source Batch, current, only Done batches: a stacked bar of the sum of Finished weight by month of Done on, colored by Product.

Sample story

Hillside spring clip arrived six weeks ago and is ninth in line, its two batches waiting; the forecast says July. Three orders are in production: one batch is spinning, one carding, and two washed this week, one of them red, under its minimum. An order went on hold four days ago over a fleece full of hay. Three orders are expected in the mail, one not yet linked to its farm. Last month eleven batches finished, one with a poor yield, and one order sits ready but unpaid. Hillside's order from last spring went home in October, and one order was cancelled before its turn.

Sources

Custom Fiber Carding and Spinning, Blackberry Ridge Woolen Mill: each customer's fiber run on its own, the stages, minimums, prices and yields.
Processing Prices & Info, The Wool Mill: a place in the production line, the skirting fee, and a call about weak or short fiber.
Fiber Processing, New England Alpaca Owners & Breeders Association: labelled lots and the machine stages, dehairing for alpaca included.

Build it

Pick your tool in the Run it box: Airtable, Fibery, Lovable, Notion or another one. Give this recipe to your AI assistant with that tool connected and it sets the process up from Details for building; or build it by hand from the same section.

The story above is enough to run the process without any tool at all.

From the Fibery Process Cookbook (https://github.com/Fibery-inc/process-cookbook), licensed CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/): copy, adapt and build it anywhere, crediting the cookbook.