Moncton Vintage Stores Find a Common Thread Across Generations
MONCTON–Three young vintage fashion lovers have found a way to do what they love while making a profit.
Stephanie Dawn Vautour runs SDV Vintage, a vintage store and retro glamour boutique, out of a space she shares with Katrine Noël and Julie Aubé, who run the slightly more contemporary style store Ok My Dear.
While it started out as a hobby, Vautour’s store has now been officially open for two years.
“I didn’t like working in an office. I wanted freedom,” Vautour said. “I wanted to make people pretty every day.”
Vautour explains that after she’d had the space for a year and her original business partner left, Noël and Aubé took over the extra space and came to an agreement with her that would allow them to continue touring with their indie folk band, Les Hay Babies. While SDV Vintage and Ok My Dear are two separate stores, the shared space allows them to work for each other when any of them is unable to man their store.
“I used to come shop here a lot and I thought it would be so cool to have a place to put all my vintage stuff because me and Kat collected vintage stuff like nutcases,” Aubé said. “It’s a really good partnership because otherwise I would never be able to have a vintage store because I am only here half of the year.”
Vautour says she has worked to create a certain kind of space where she not only sells vintage wares, but also makes people feel good about themselves.
“We’re just playing dressup and not giving a crap and just having fun,” she said. “I like to create a space where when you come in you feel good, it smells good, it’s pretty and then you leave feeling really great.”
“I love someone walking in the door and having that look of awe and wonder on their face because they’ve never seen such a great little collection of all these treasures and trinkets and things we’ve spent year collecting and I love sharing that with people.”
Vautour says that when she can, she likes to take time with each customer to pick out items or outfits that fit their personality and let them go out into the world feeling great about what they’re wearing.
Many pieces at SDV Vintage have stories to them since they’re often bought from original owners. Vautour enjoys passing along these treasures to new owners and sometimes even gets to see them have second lives as outfits worn to special life events.
Aubé and Noël explain that because Ok My Dear focuses on the more recent style decades and is a bit more about casual wear, the stores do not take business away from each other.
“It works out in a way that we don’t really take away business from each other because people come in looking for different things,” Aubé said. “Some people are going to a vintage themed wedding and then some people just want a vintage souvenir sweater…when people come to sell stuff to us, if it’s like 1920’s hats, I’m not going to take it because I know that’s exactly what Stephanie buys. We help each other out.”
Along with their vintage pieces, the stores also carry art and jewelry by local artists.
“I started inviting my tattoo artist, who does paintings, a local photographer who makes jewelry as well, just interesting little pieces but now that the word has gotten out that we’re supporting artists, we have to change the way out selection process works or do a six month rotation with an application process,” Vautour said.
“We’re trying to get artists now that either don’t have the means or funds or exposure to rent other spaces. I want to give them a start because not everyone has the cash to have a booth at the flea market or wherever so we’re being a little more selective with our local artists now.”
SDV Vintage and Ok My Dear have both established strong presences on social media. They’ve found that it helps people visualize how to style the more unique pieces that some customers find daunting.
“Vintage is still becoming more of a trend so sometimes people need a little push to actually buy and buy that eccentric piece of clothing,” Noël said. “Sometimes we’ll put a really crazy shirt with normal jeans and something to make it casual or play it down a little bit. It works well. Sometimes people fight over Instagram pictures.”
Vautour says the cooperation between SDV Vintage and Ok My Dear is a common survival technique she’s started to see around the province.
“Instead of being competition, we teamed up and that’s definitely the way a lot of young entrepreneurs are going right now. Our economy in New Brunswick is awful, everyone knows that. Young entrepreneurs need to take chances and work together. That’s the only way we’re going to succeed in this province right now.”