Match-makers have a slack season, in which many of them sell flowers, or go "hopping." Laundry work is largely "season" work.
Fur-sewing is perhaps the worst example of the terrible effect of irregular work taken with low wages.

"For several months in the year the fur-sewers have either no work, or earn about 3s.

or 4s.

a week, and many of these work in overcrowded insanitary workshops in the season.
Fur-sewing is the worst paid industry in the East End, with absolutely no exceptions."[35] [Greek: b].

Fluctuations in fashion affect many women's trades; in particular, the "ornamental" clothing trades, e.g.furs, feathers, trimmings, etc.
Employers in these slack times prefer generally to keep on the better hands (on lower wages), and to dismiss the inferior hands.
These "natural" fluctuations, added to ordinary trade irregularities, favour the employment of "outdoor" workers in sweaters' dens or at home, and require in these trades, as conducted at present, the existence of an enormous margin of "casual" workers.