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Our returns policy explained

Obviously when we embroider a name on a tallit bag or sew on an atara, it's considered customization, however, sometimes our customers don't realize that when we tie on tzitzit, it's also customization.

If you walk into a store in Israel that specializes in tallit and tzitzit products (there are only a few dozen around the country, and ours is just about the only such online shop), you'll find that they do have a limited number of tzitzit products already tied, sitting on the shelf. These will invariably be items that sell a lot, in common sizes with common tzitzit options. For example, a cotton tallit katan, in size 8 and 9, with thin hand-spun tzitzit, Ashkenazi tying. But for the most part, customers either tie themselves, or pay first and then come back the next day to pick up the item.

The reason is simple. Take, for example, a fairly common product, like a wool tallit katan. We sell it in five different sizes, with black stripes or white stripes, T-neck or round neck, one hole or two holes, with fringes or without fringes. We offer 12 different types of tzitzit strings, and 14 tying customs. If you do the math, that comes out to 9,600 possible combinations for that one single product!

Even if we use as our example a product with just three options – size, tzitzit strings and tying custom – it still comes out to 600 possible combinations.

If a customer finds they didn't order the right size, etc., were they to return it to us, it would be extremely unlikely that we'd get another order for that exact same customized tallit katan within, say, a year or two.

Removing tzitzit strings is a lot of work; untying can take almost as long as tying. (And in the case of Yemenite/Rambam knots, it's nearly impossible.) Even after you untie the tzitzit, the strings will typically have curls that make them quite a challenge to use. So there are significant labor costs involved.

While we realize that from our customers' perspective, it can be difficult to select just the right size online, we hope they can appreciate that as a business with low prices and a low profit margin, we cannot afford to absorb such losses.