18 - JACKSON HOLE WOMAN, Jackson Hole News&Guide, Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Resale therapy
The women of First American Title Insurance Company thank you for choosing Teton County’s oldest title company.
in a resort town
Consignment shops help move unwanted items to new homes.
Back: Molly Thorn, Amy Evans, Melissa Capener, Kathy Needham Front: Laura Ginty
By Teresa Griswold
T
Experience, integrity and incomparable customer service have built a legacy that generations have come to rely upon. WE ARE FIRST AMERICAN TITLE INSURANCE COMPANY. 175 South King Street 307.733.2597 phone • 307.733.8530 fax www.firstam.com/title-wy/teton 244007
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op designer clothes, high-end decorator furnishings and musthave kids items at affordable prices are available in Jackson every day. Really. And for a fraction of the cost one would pay at a chichi store in the city or via online retailers. A recent look at Zappos.com shows a pair of kids Ugg boots on sale for $100. A browse through Just for Kids, a resale shop in Jackson, turns up the same item, albeit “gently used” and in only one size, for $60. Women-owned resale shops catering to a tight budget and filling a niche for affordable goods in a pricey resort town are booming in Jackson as people look for value and ways to earn extra income. Not only can a person buy affordable, gently used gems at such shops, one can consign poor-fitting, no longer useful clothes and furnishings to make a little money. One local resident claims she has earned $1,000 in the last year from consigning clothes at Queenie & Co. A quick glance around Home Again in Movieworks Plaza reveals a savvy, rustic-infused interior showroom full of high-quality furnishings and decor. A budget-minded shopper who did not know the store was primarily consignment might initially shy away because it looks high-end. Until they home in on the price tags: Items expected to sell for $1,000 at retail are priced one-quarter of that at Home Again. Lisa Gute, who opened Home Again nine years ago, knows the resale market intimately after being in the consignment business for 20 years. She opened her first resale business, a clothing store called Threads, in 1992 near the University of Utah and made her first month’s rent on the first day. She segued into interior design with a home furnishings resale store six years later, opening the original Home Again in Salt Lake City. When she visited her then-boyfriend, now husband, in Jackson, it was love at first sight — the perfect spot for a new Home Again. She saw that furniture prices were out of reach in Jackson and knew locals would appreciate a break. Gute credits her ability to offer high-quality goods in part to being in a resort town.
BRADLY J. BONER / NEWS&GUIDE
Home Again owner Lisa Gute sits with her staff: Christina Atkinson, Liza Rowley and Molly Kingsley.
“The quality in this valley is huge, because there are so many secondhome owners,” she said. “When they sell, we get the whole house, which is a lot of furniture that a designer has brought in from places like Texas and California.” Home Again’s 4,600-square-foot showroom is constantly changing. “It’s amazing how fast things go in and out,” Gute said. “The thing with consignment that is so cool is that the store only works if the community shares in the consignment process, because [locals] are bringing you merchandise and making purchases.” Gute sees consignment shopping as a way of life. “Once you accept you can wear used and buy used, you can’t pay retail prices any more,” she said. Gute likes to shop at Beautiful, Thrifty, Rich and Queenie & Co., two resale clothiers in Jackson. She recently mined a BCBG party dress from Beautiful, Thrifty, Rich. Along with designer dresses, Beautiful, Thrifty, Rich sells cowboy boots — a lot of them, says Caryn Cook, proprietress of the clothing shop. “In the month of July, we moved over 300 used cowboy boots,” she said. “It’s definitely a big part of our business.” Cook’s mother, Tammy Cook, opened Just for Kids a year ago October. “I’m everybody’s grandma now,” See RESALE on 19
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