Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 The one in Fort McMurray, wood, Buffalo, and the rest of the world. You've tuned into the Mac CD morning show. I am your host Elliot Pierre, and we're going to start the show off the same way we start every show off with a moment of gratitude. I know you could be doing a million other things with your time, and the fact that you spend with us truly means the world to me. So thank you on that note, Tanner hit him with the intro
Speaker 4 00:00:30 Hey everybody, Keith Simpson here from there, Alto data, we support the El parents. We've joined the drive-in movie theater. We're involved in the marathon here in Fort McMurray, and that's what makes this community such an amazing place to live.
Speaker 0 00:00:45 And we're back for everybody who heard that ringing. That was 100% me. And let's just identify what that was. I don't think we ever talked about this on the show before Tanner.
Speaker 5 00:00:54 I don't think we have
Speaker 0 00:00:55 So on my phone at three o'clock, I have an alarm that goes off every day at three o'clock. It doesn't matter what day, seven days a week. It goes off. And it's a reminder for me to think positively, um, and, or throw positive energy into the universe because a while ago I found out that there's a bunch of religious texts, Bibles, whatever you want to call it. And I found out that three o'clock and a lot of different, um, religious Bibles, uh, is the hour that the gods are listening to you more intently. So that's when you should pray or throw some positive vibes into the universe. So every day at three o'clock, I throw positive vibes into the universe because I feel that somebody is listening. So that's what that alarm was. So on with the show. Thank you to our sponsors, Norelle Toyota for kicking off the show, being our title sponsors. We really do appreciate it. And Tanner, I know you're stressed a little bit right now, so I'm hoping the sound to sound good.
Speaker 5 00:01:50 I'm not as stressed as I was
Speaker 0 00:01:51 Before. Okay. That's good to hear. Now let's get to on with our guests now, as you know, I don't introduce my guests because they can do a better job at that than myself. So can you please tell everybody at home who you are and what you're about?
Speaker 6 00:02:01 Well, thanks for having me and I'm Jenis KAUST. I'm the owner of thrifty Dodge girl kicking him, and then soon to be, um, thrifty Dutch's downtown on at town hall on Frazier.
Speaker 0 00:02:14 Okay. So explain what the says to me,
Speaker 6 00:02:18 It's a thrift store, uh, like a regular thrift store, um, just privately owned. Um, so you bring donations to me. I go through it, um, and pick what we'd like to have in the store and whatever we don't take, we'll give you either shelter or donate to salvation army. And then we give a percentage of our profits about 20 to 30% right now, hopefully we'll be able to do more or, um, with the new store. And, uh, and then we give to different charities monthly and we've had, yeah, quite a few different ones. We've had Ash fam we've had the wellness society. We've had support through housing group, um, lots of different ones like that.
Speaker 0 00:02:57 Right. Very cool. Okay. So explain this concept to me. So let's say I have some clothes at home and I don't want to wear them anymore. Yeah. They're still fine. I bring them to you. Yes. And then I drop them off for free. You're not compensating me at all.
Speaker 6 00:03:12 Nope. Free. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:03:13 Okay, cool. And then somebody in Fort McMurray, you'll look at it, price it appropriately, and then somebody comes in. Yeah, cool. I like that model. Okay. So that's what I thought it was and I'm right. Big win for me. So now my next question is how do you get that started in regards to building your inventory?
Speaker 6 00:03:35 Well, um, girl gang group shouted, girl gang group. Here's amazing. I just put a post that I was doing something like this and that we were looking for donations and, um, I hadn't even had a story yet or anything. And my living room and kitchen were completely full of garbage bags, boxes and donations and everything. So awesome. My husband was like, you need to find a space. We need our house back. So yeah. So then we found a space at beacon hill to start with and uh, yeah. Then we just brought it over and kept.
Speaker 0 00:04:07 Okay. Now how long have you had the store for me? Like starting from your house?
Speaker 6 00:04:12 Um, I would, we started, we opened the store June 25th and uh, so we've been doing it nine months now. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:04:20 Okay. So it's going well then, like house to location, one to moving, I'm assuming to something a little bit bigger. Yeah,
Speaker 6 00:04:29 Yeah, yeah. So we're going to do both stores. So we'll do, um, the one in beacon hill is just, women's only the one downtown is going to be kids. Men's women's home decor, maternity, like kind of everything. Yeah. So
Speaker 0 00:04:44 Cool.
Speaker 6 00:04:45 Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:04:46 Yeah.
Speaker 6 00:04:47 Well, I had so many ladies come in and be like, oh, I wish she did kids. Oh, I wish you did home decor. And then I'd have men come in with their wives and be like, do you have Benz? Do you have, men's like, I'd be looking at men's right now. And I'm like, oh, I'm like, yeah, we should do that. And I wanted to go bigger to start with, but my husband was like, start small, start small it's Fort McMurry. We don't really, and we just moved here. So we were like, didn't really know the market or anything yet. It's been so good. And that we're like, why wouldn't we go bigger and try and do everything?
Speaker 0 00:05:14 That's right. So what was the creative process or what was the spark to say like, Hey, this is a service that I see could be utilized in this community.
Speaker 6 00:05:24 Well, um, when we moved here, it was during the flood and everything was closed down and there was no thrifting here and I am a thrifter at heart. Like that is my that's my de-stressing. If it's not yoga, it's thrifting. It's
Speaker 0 00:05:37 Like,
Speaker 6 00:05:37 And there was no thrifting here. And I was like, what do I do with myself? And I was selling on Poshmark. I'm not sure if you've heard of that, but it's an app online that you can sell, use coding,
Speaker 6 00:05:48 And then you just ship it out. It's really easy. And so I was doing that for a little while and I was just filling up a room in our house and my husband was like, jokingly, he's like, you should start a store or something. And I was like, you know what? And so I kind of had like a weekend sale at the house. And so many ladies came and were like desperate for clothes. I was like, why should do something with this? So I thought, you know, there's no other thrift store at that moment. And salvation army was just opening up again too. And so I was like, you know, maybe I'll just do something small, a boutique kind of thing. And yeah. So kind of came from there. Cool,
Speaker 0 00:06:25 Cool. I love it. So where are you from originally before you moved here?
Speaker 6 00:06:31 Um, I was born and raised in from Heller, dinosaur
Speaker 0 00:06:34 Valley
Speaker 6 00:06:36 And um, and then my husband and I are from medicine hat. We moved, he's born and raised in medicine hat and we moved there and had our kids. And so,
Speaker 0 00:06:44 So there are lots of third store's in medicine hat.
Speaker 6 00:06:48 Yeah, there's a boat. I would say like four or five there. They have a flat value village. They have a couple downtown and they're a little bit smaller than us. So I was like, why wouldn't we be able to handle some thrift stores here? So
Speaker 0 00:07:01 That's right. I did like, see, I, I'm just going to make fun of me now. I know I'm getting ready for it. I only knew about thrift stores and like major centers, like Edmonton. Like when you go down white app, there's like a three store here and there. Um, I had no real idea. I've, haven't spent a lot of time in thrift stores. So
Speaker 5 00:07:22 I feel like your first, uh, like relationship with thrift stores was the Mack Macklemore song.
Speaker 0 00:07:28 Yeah.
Speaker 5 00:07:29 Like you probably didn't know about them before that. Cause,
Speaker 0 00:07:31 Well, I had gone into a thrift store in west Edmonton or not west, sorry, on white avenue one time. And I did get a blazer. This is when I was in college. And I thought like the whole concept was pretty interesting, but it's not something that I went down that rabbit hole. So what the thought process is so cool, especially like with, as you get older, you, your body type changes. And so then you have this article of clothing that you're just like, well, it's still really good. What should I do with it? Yeah. Or like I have like a little boy, for example, Keegan. Jeez. He's seven. And he Just keeps growing and I tell him to stop. Cause I liked him when he was a baby. He was super cute. And now I'm like, dude, come on. That's so cute. Not for cute. Now he's becoming an adult. He's even cooler now though, I got to say seven great age,
Speaker 5 00:08:18 Less cute. More cool.
Speaker 0 00:08:20 More cool. Yeah. And big trash talker, which I can't get enough of. But like at that age, when you're looking for clothing, especially in the community, like Fort McMurray, unfortunately there's not a lot of options. Right. So neat the concept to me. So cool. So when you say you were, uh, like into thrift, what does that mean? Like did you just go and like,
Speaker 6 00:08:42 Yeah, you go your treasure hunting,
Speaker 0 00:08:44 Treasure hunt.
Speaker 6 00:08:46 It's like, for me, it's like, I get a high from it. Like, okay, what am I going to find in this rack? And I got it. Sometimes I have to like look through the entire rack. Like it can't just be like, look of, I, it has to be the entire rack. Right. Because I don't want to miss anything.
Speaker 0 00:08:59 So now you have individuals donating clothes locally to you. Is this something that you, do you go to other locations to look for more clothes to bring back or?
Speaker 6 00:09:10 Yeah. So I'll go through it through myself and bring back lots of brands and different things that we don't get here. Because one thing about having a thrift store in a small town that has, doesn't have a lot of clothing stores. Like we have some great ones, but yeah. Um, I get a lot of what we have here. Right. So a lot of people are like, well, I don't want to buy the same stuff. I could've just bought here anyhow. Um, and I totally respect that and get that, but I'm like, this is what we get. So I'll go outside of town and I'll still like bring back lots of different things too. But with that, you have to be careful too, because some thrift stores like are getting a little bit pricey and stuff like that. And so when I bring it back and I still have to get a little cost out of it, I don't want it to be astronomical. I don't want, I'm not out there for the money I'm out. I'm there for the hobby of it. It's something, you know, I just wanted to do, I just want to make sure that we can have just as good pricing or better.
Speaker 0 00:10:03 Yeah. Fair enough. What are you unique thing to do for a living? I love it. It's kind of like, I do something pretty unique for a living as well, but uh, that's cool. Treasure hunting or living. That's really neat. So where did the aspect of giving back come in for you in regards to, you're saying a percentage of your sentence go to not-for-profits.
Speaker 6 00:10:26 Yeah. Yeah. I just, I wanted to make sure like, people are just like, I don't want to just get my stuff for free and stuff like that. Right. But I, I wanted to contribute to the community in, in just different ways. Right. Um, that we could just help out in any way, like anytime, like someone reaches out and messages me like this group or this thing, like any or people that just walk in and they're just talking, they're like, oh, we're looking for this. And I'm like, you know what? I can donate that. And let's, let's do a project on or something like that. So it's just, yeah. I just, the community has been great. Um, yeah. So it's been so good to just offer new things to it and donate and do whatever.
Speaker 0 00:11:02 Cool. Now we spoke very briefly before the show started, your husband moved here before you and was working and I'm assuming,
Speaker 6 00:11:10 Well, he was seven on seven off. So he would drive 10 hours each week here and back. And then he, yeah, so he was up here, uh, for about six years and then he got offered a different position that was going to be full time. So family had to come up.
Speaker 0 00:11:27 Okay. That's what I was going to ask. I was like, what made you actually like, say like, okay, I guess I'm coming.
Speaker 6 00:11:33 Yeah. It wasn't my ideal like idea of coming up here. I, I like big cities and being going to sh shopping malls and lots of thrift stores. I, when I found out there was like, not even at three-star at the time I was like
Speaker 0 00:11:48 Doing,
Speaker 6 00:11:50 But no, it worked out really well. Uh, it's been great so far. The community has been awesome.
Speaker 0 00:11:55 That's awesome. All listen, uh, we come to the segment called the Maxine a minute it's Tanner segment, but before we kick it off, we got to give a big shout out to Napa, Napa sponsoring this segment. So now, but thank you very much. We do appreciate your support. If you don't know who Napa is, they're an awesome indigenous organization in Fort McMurray. Go check them out on their website or their Facebook page. Thank you Napa. Now on that note, Tena hit her with the Mac city minute.
Speaker 5 00:12:18 Alrighty. Question number one. What is the most interesting piece of clothing you've seen come through your shop?
Speaker 6 00:12:27 Um, had this Valentino skirt come in and you might not know designers, but Valentino is pretty big deal. So I was pretty stoked about that. Um, but for like weird or odd. Um, so we've had these like really cool, like for vest that were really cool. Yeah. And a fuzzy pink one. That was awesome.
Speaker 0 00:12:49 Cool.
Speaker 5 00:12:50 Question number two. What is your favorite part of the thrifting culture?
Speaker 6 00:12:57 I think just the rush of it. It's, everyone's like, that's kind of in that culture knows like the rush and the feeling you get and like the high you get from like finding that awesome treasure item. That's just like, and it's super cheap.
Speaker 5 00:13:12 Question number three. What is your favorite part of starting your business in the community you had just arrived in?
Speaker 6 00:13:20 Oh, just the amount of support and help to girl gang group. It, they were just like, here I have stuff. I have stuff. And even that's how I found the place in beacon hill was through, uh, one of the girls messaged me about it saying that they had a space available. So just the, yeah, everyone coming together and just wanting to be helpful.
Speaker 5 00:13:41 Question number four. What is the story behind your favorite piece you've found for yourself? Well, thrifting,
Speaker 6 00:13:55 Um, I found when I was a little bit younger, 13, a loop Tom bag, and I was stoked and I, it had the like little cherry blossoms and it was a special edition and everything I found out later on, when I learned about fakes and reels, it was fake. It was my pride and joy and I still have it to this day. It's actually in a cabinet. I still love it.
Speaker 5 00:14:22 And your final question, why do you think any Fort McMurray team wouldn't love thrifting?
Speaker 6 00:14:30 Just being able to, uh, yeah, just like feel the treasure hunt of it. And I understand like sometimes it's taboo for some people, they don't want to have used items or other people's items, but we get a lot of stuff with tags on it still. So even coming and just finding those things of takes on it, it's still fun, you know, and itself. And is the number one pollutant, you know, in on the planet, you know? So just being able to reuse and, um, uh, yeah, it's awesome. So
Speaker 0 00:15:01 Very
Speaker 5 00:15:01 Cool. And those have been your five questions.
Speaker 0 00:15:03 I'm a bit of a thrift store, a fanatic myself and my thrift store is my dad's closet. Yeah. I'm hijacking so much GP stuff. It's not even funny. Like he's like, what did I like? He'll go into his closet where my Jackie go and my mom will be like, you should probably give your son a call. He's just, but it's cool to wear something that has like a story to it. And
Speaker 6 00:15:29 That means something
Speaker 0 00:15:30 Right. And you're guaranteed. Nobody else is wearing it. No, like you said, you're talking about for vests. I have this jacket that I very like a hijack from him. It's like a, I'll show it to you before you leave. It's a wool jacket with like a fur top. It's like warm his jacket in the world and yeah, just hijack that from GP. So I get it. Like, I've never gone, like you said, hunting, but I get how that thrill of like finding that item that you were looking for. Yeah. It could be really, really cool. So I've got a question for you in regards to, okay. You're moving to this new place and you said you're gonna have men's women, um, and children's clothes, but then you also said like items.
Speaker 6 00:16:11 Yeah. Like home decor items. So
Speaker 0 00:16:13 What did we talk? Yeah. So explain that one. How are you going to get your hands on those?
Speaker 6 00:16:16 Um, well, people donate all like all sorts of stuff like that. Right. So if you go to any like value village or Goodwill or anything that you'll find all sorts of stuff like that as well. So, and they donate like furniture pitchers or vases or yeah. All sorts of things. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:16:33 No, what we should do Tanner,
Speaker 5 00:16:35 Why
Speaker 0 00:16:36 We, uh, so this is like, this is an office. There's other rooms here. This is a business we should, uh, we should get the green room. We should decorate the green with all stuff.
Speaker 5 00:16:48 Thrift store, thrift stores and antique shops. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:16:52 That'd be pretty fun. That'd be awesome. And then like, just like to help promote and like say, Hey, we got this from there and like dedicate the room to like that type of thing. Yeah.
Speaker 6 00:17:01 Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:17:03 I think we might do this. Cool.
Speaker 6 00:17:05 You can find the coolest
Speaker 0 00:17:06 Stuff.
Speaker 5 00:17:07 Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:17:08 Yeah, yeah, exactly. We have a contact now we have a club. So when does the new store open downtown?
Speaker 6 00:17:14 We're hoping for the end of April at latest, early weekend made. Right. The flooring's just getting, going to be put in soon and we're just getting that kind of stuff sorted out. And then we can just go ahead, get her all done.
Speaker 0 00:17:31 Okay. Now I'm assuming leading up to that, like you're trying to collect as much inventory as possible to like really fill up that space. Yeah.
Speaker 6 00:17:38 Well, at the moment we're not, I am, I do have quite a bit right now, so I'm trying to get into this space and it's set up before I start getting so much, because if I am getting so much and I'm not able to set up as fast, so if I can set up as fast as I can, then I'll be taking the notes donations. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:17:56 Okay. Now, in regards to the decoration and how, like you have designed your store, is that just you or do you have help or how does that all put that together?
Speaker 6 00:18:05 The one in beacon hill is all me and I'm the one in town hall will be on me as well. I have really loved the aesthetic of town hall down
Speaker 0 00:18:13 There.
Speaker 6 00:18:14 Um, so I really, I was like in love with that. As soon as I walked in, I was like, yep, this is it. Um, so I'll probably bring like, kind of that aesthetic there. So it's going to be a different kind of look versus my beacon hill one.
Speaker 0 00:18:25 Right?
Speaker 6 00:18:26 Yeah. So
Speaker 0 00:18:27 Needs, I got to check this out. Although like you said, there's no dues close up. I don't care. I still need to come check it out. It sounds like a really cool place.
Speaker 6 00:18:36 Yeah. We have to like some vintage coaches and we have like a Marie Antoinette head. I'm like, okay. And it's, yeah. It's pretty unique and different and yeah.
Speaker 0 00:18:46 Very cool. Well, listen, we're at the end of the 20 minutes. Thank you so much for coming on. Uh, please feel free to come back again and again, and again, it doesn't cost anything. And then you probably have an definitely have more to talk about and for the launch of your store, like please come back and chat. So, uh, but before I cut you loose, everybody gets a shameless shout out or plugs. So got the mix, the camera and lights have fun.
Speaker 6 00:19:08 Well, I just wanted to say thank you to this community to start with, because I couldn't have done it with any, like without you guys, like it's been awesome and just come and check us out. I, even if you're not our, thrifter just come check us out. We're not like the average their store, you know, we try to be more boutique-y and stuff like that. So yeah. We're thrifty Duchess. And uh, and then, um, thrifty, Dutch girl and beacon hill.
Speaker 0 00:19:29 Cool. Awesome. Well, definitely you must have social media channels that people. Yeah.
Speaker 6 00:19:33 Yeah. So we have both, um, thrifty, Dutch girl and thrifty touches on Facebook and on Instagram.
Speaker 0 00:19:39 Cool. Hopefully people follow you there. Great. Well for Macquarie wood, Buffalo and the rest of the world. Thank you very much for tuning into another episode of the Mac city morning show. I do appreciate it. Big shout out to our sponsors title sponsor neurol Toyota, as well as the max city minute sponsor and Napa. I really do appreciate your support. I hope everybody's having a great day and we'll see you tomorrow. Face
Speaker 7 00:20:00 Y Dalio Wade, and another morning show later by us.
Speaker 8 00:20:09 You
Speaker 9 00:20:18 Talk about quenching your ugly thirst.
