I spoke with two employees today and they told me that Walmarts all over are phasing out their craft/material department.  We have a new SuperCenter that is opening in August and they will not have this department at all.  The small store will be transferring everything over to the new store then.  They were told not to order anything else for this department!!   (and just when I was getting back into crafting!)  They suggested if anyone had a problem with this or to complain, just call l-800-Walmart!

If this is true it is certainly distressing....I will be bummed.

They have been doing this for awhile with their fabric department. I know when our Walmart was remodeled, the craft section is now limited to 3 small aisles. One thing they did expand was the scrapbooking area, and they also have a Martha Stewart craft section. We used to have a very large fabric area, but now it's just 1/2 an aisle.

I'm sad to see that what used to be an entire department within the store is now down to one isle.  I have to travel 28 miles one-way, to the nearest craft store for fabric or yarn now.  If I don't find what I want there, the other fabric stores are even further away. 

I think I'll send an e-mail to Walmart, with the hope that a written letter will get farther than a phone call.  Maybe a letter and a call will be even better?  Since there's strength in numbers, if anyone else is interested in contacting Walmart:

Email from this website: 
http://walmartstores.com/contactus/feedback.aspx

Mail questions or comments to:
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
Attn: Customer Service
702 S.W. 8th Street
Bentonville, AR 72716

Call 1-800-WALMART (1-800-925-6278), 
7 a.m. to 9 p.m. (CT) Monday - Friday, 
9 a.m. to 9 p.m. (CT) Saturday or 
12 p.m. to 6 p.m. (CT) Sunday.

Are they marking anything down?  Yarn?

the walmart here got rid of the materials section a year or 2 ago when they remodeled and moved everything around...  now they have 1 measly aisle and NO fabric. I hate it... no fabric store even close....  have to drive to the wally world in hermitage  (where they still have it... for now)  to get the fabric..... sure there is a small fabric store here... but I cant afford it :)

I sure no this is true.  I needed orange yarn this weekend for a Halloween project went to 5 differnet stores (walmart and Kmart included) no yarn any where.  Finally traveled all the way to Michael's they had a big sign up "All new yarn dept coming this Spring."  Well must be late Spring because they had to small skeins of orange and hardly any other yarn.  Guess yarn will be the next thing I will have to shop for on line to get the good colors.

FYI - I wrote to Walmart, and this is the response I just received:

Thank you for your recent inquiry regarding the fabric department in your local store.  As with any merchandise decision that we make, we have based our decision to reduce the stitching and fabric departments on customer demand, which does not appear to be as high today for a full stitching and fabric offering in some markets as it may have been at Wal-Mart in the past.

In keeping with our emphasis on being a store of the community, Wal-Mart is converting the fabrics and crafts department in some stores to a newly expanded assortment of merchandise that focuses on life's celebrations.  We are thrilled to offer our customers this exciting new crafts and celebrations center that makes available craft and party planning needs along with information on current trends and new ideas in the area of life's celebrations, such as holidays, weddings and birthdays.

In those stores where the new crafts and celebrations center is placed, merchandise commonly referred to as 'notions' will be included in the product offerings - such as sewing machines, yarn, needles, thread, etc.  As a part of this conversion, most of our new and remodeled stores that opened earlier this year, as well as a small number of existing stores, will feature the new crafts and celebrations center in place of bolt fabrics.  Wal-Mart will continue to carry cut fabric in most of our stores.  Due to the continued evaluation of our stores, we are unable to share a list of existing stores scheduled to receive the new crafts and celebrations center at this time.