Barney Lopilato, the president of Blanket Boss, has been making baby blankets in the knitting industry since the late 1970s. Back then, there were no computers and all the designs had to be punched into Mylar plastic. Over the years the machines became computerized and made it possible to do more intricate designs.
I still have a contract from 1997 that was faxed to me from Stoll America agreeing to rent a knitting machine from them. At the time, our company‘s name was “Sample to Sample” because we used to make sample sweaters for the show rooms in Manhattan when there was still a garment industry in New York.
Ever since, we have kept up with the latest knitting machines and computers. In 2022, we purchased a knitting machine that was imported from China – because there currently isn’t any more inventory of machines left in the USA. Most of the knitting industry is now either in Turkey or China. Blanket Boss is one of the last companies manufacturing baby blankets in the USA.
