Woodstock Vibes offers hard-to-find, hipster and vintage treasures

By Laurie Gordon
Franklin — A Volkswagen bus from the sixties spray-painted in rainbow colors sits in front of one very cool store. It's called Woodstock Vibes, and as the name suggests, the atmosphere carries through its doors and countless racks of one-of-a-kind, hard-to-find, quality, name brand vintage clothing, shoes and accessories. Prices are great, staff is friendly and the treasures you'll find are truly amazing. Customers are flocking to the store from all over the region.
About three years ago, Kurt De Pourcq was trying to create additional income for his business, Shepitex, L.L.C."We were exporting one hundred percent of our production and getting killed by the increasingly stronger US dollar," he said, "The idea was to sell the better items domestically so we would be less dependent on the dollar." And so, a family-run wholesale vintage and hipster store located in Shepitex LLC's warehouse in Franklin was born .Woodstock Vibes features hand selected products available in stock including shoes, purses and jewelry. The business has been so successful, that it recently moved to a store with a 3,000-foot mezzanine area, in Franklin, filled with all kinds of treasures.
De Pourcq said, "My wife and my son's fiancee came up with the name. They wanted a name associated with the sixties because we were strictly selling vintage and hipster clothing and they wanted to create a warm, welcoming vibe in the store. Thus Woodstock Vibes."
The store's vintage and hipster pieces are sorted into over 80 different categories and subcategories, "We are not affiliated with any retail stores," De Pourcg said, "Our vintage comes directly from our own credential clothing. We purchase our clothing from different regions, thus providing us with a mix of goods that feature a wide array of styles from various eras in fashion."
The fledgling Woodstock Vibes on Park Place was very small with limited items. "It was just a try out to see how people would react," De Pourcg said. "First we got the friends from my son's fiancee, then came the mothers who wanted more fashionable items. We slowly expanded till we reached 2,500 sq/ft. We also had limited opening hours, just Friday and Saturday. Our customers loved the quality and the atmosphere and were pushing for more opening hours and more items."
In February 1015, they decided to find a store location. "There's limited availability close to our warehouse location," said De Pourcg. "We wanted something closely and on a busy road. We were intrigued by the old Masonic building on Route 94, the location of Sussex County Discount Wine and Liquor. Even though the building looked dull and boring, we realized it had great potential once gutted out and properly restored. Thanks to Mr. Pingle, the owner. who was willing to invest in a major upgrade of his building the store became what it is now."
Woodstock Vibes processes about 70,000 pieces of used clothing and 30,000 pairs of used shoes every single week. "My wife selects the items based on trends, styles, unique look and quality," De Pourcg said. "We use only the best two percent of the 100,000 items we process every week.Compare that to eight percent for a regular good quality thrift store or thirty percent for a typical Salvation Army or Goodwill store. Each item is basically handpicked."
The mezzanine is used to process and sort the selected items for the current season. Items are categorized and whenever there's a shortage of a certain item in the store, the owners go upstairs and pick from the seasonal inventory. The non seasonal items (spring and summer) are categorized, folded and placed in strong, ventilated bags to be placed in storage for the upcoming season. De Pourcg said, "We have an estimated 50,000 items in inventory, ready to get priced and brought to the store when needed. We have a color code for the tags we use to price the items. Everything is computerized so we know how long an item sits in the store."
De Pourcg explained, "We remove the oldest priced items before we start a new color code. We have three different colored tags in use any time. So basically and item gets a three moths life span in the store before it gets removed. We don't believe in "Sales". From the get going, we price our items to sell, not to sit there for weeks and then you have to knock off fifty percent to make it affordable for your customers. Lots of customers ask us why the items are priced so low, again, we price to sell. Regular customers found out that it's better to buy the item when it's available. Lots of time when they come back the next day or week, the item is gone."
Where does Woodstock Vibes find such unique items? De Poucrg said, "We purchase used clothing form very high income areas. These include Manhattan, Boston and New Jersey, but also from Nashville, Tennessee. We find those unique vintage and hipster items due to the variety of supply we get. None of the items are coming from consignments. Prices would double if we follow the consignment model because you have to split the sales with the cosigner."
Some of Woodstock Vibes' more unique sub-categories include: vintage band T shirts, knitted sweaters, colorful ponchos and dresses, and tons of vintage flannel shirts." De Pourcg said, "There's something unique for each customer, sized from XS to XXL."
"We hired two people to co manage the store during the week, Sigita and Adam who are both doing a fantastic job," De Pourcg said, "My wife, Robert and son, Thimo, help run the store on Saturdays and Thimo and Robert manage on Sundays. Thimo is managing the used clothing processing part of the business but it's important for him to get a feeling for the retail part and to build relations with the customers. The store and the warehouse are a family run business. We have a great group of people from different ages and cultures working at the warehouse and the store. We all chip in and carry a part of the load, nobody is above anyone else."
Shepitex LLC is a company specialized in exporting used clothing and shoes to micro-enterprises in third world countries. Shepitex purchases its raw material from well known, reputable charities and private collectors in the US. These organizations are paid a fee for their product to enable them to cover their costs for shipping, labor and administrative expenses. Once the goods arrive at our facility we re-sort and package these items. The clothing is compacted and neatly wrapped in either 300lbs cap sacks (#1 clothing) or 800-850 pound bales (salvage grade #2 clothing) to provide a protective cover for storage and transportation and the shoes and other small items such as toys and handbags are packed in 30lbs or 50lbs transparent bags. De Pourcg said, "Shepitex LLC is the umbrella company. Woodstock Vibes is just a part of the main business. You can't open a store under the Shepitex name. It's just not very catchy."
Creating the Woodstock Vibes atmosphere was a fun task. De Pourcq said, "We found the bus under a tree in the backyard of one of my neighbors in Wantage where we live. The young couple we bought it from lived in it for two years and traveled all over the USA. They decided to spray paint the bus in the current color scheme during one of their trips. You have to admit, they did a fantastic job and it can't look more hippy and sixties then the way they did it. It took me two months to clean it out and to make it look presentable.I promised the previous owners never to sell it without offering it to them first."
As you enter up the stairs, an old Beetle awaits. De Pourcg said, "I was searching for an old beetle to slice up in two parts and stick it on the wall as decoration when I found the beetle on eBay in the exact same color scheme as the bus. Thimo and my wife convinced me not to butcher the beetle but to keep it in one piece and place it by the steps inside the store. Thank God I listened to them."
Woodstock Vibes has changed the De Pourcg family. "We personally used to shop at the mall to purchase clothing and shoes," the owner said. "To us, it was disturbing to see how disorganized some of the stores are, lots of associates are under paid and not motivated. Prices are very high and the choice is limited. We try hard to create a store where it's just the opposite. We clean every day before we open and we are closed on Mondays to clean the whole store and to reorganize the items by style and size. We pay our people very well so they stay motivated. Everyone gets greeted in a friendly manner and gets personal attention while checking out. We are open for any race or religion because we believe that the world would be a much better place when we all get along. At Woodstock Vibes, you get a chance to spend your hard earned money and go home with unique quality items and feel happy about your purchase without breaking the bank. We are child friendly, we invested a lot in a handicap ramp and an elevator to make the store accessible for mothers with strollers and customers with a disability. We probably will open another location in the coming years but only when we are able to find enough good supply so we can assure that the quality at Woodstock Vibes stays the same."
Woodstock Vibes is located at 3235 Route 94 in Frankliin. Email: WoodstockVibes@gmail.com, phone: (973) 823-1192 or find Woodstock Vibes on Facebook. Store Hours: Tuesday: 10 am - 6 pm, Wednesday: 10 am - 6 pm, Thursday: 10 am - 6 pm, Friday: 10 am - 6 pm, Saturday: 10 am - 6 pm, and Sunday: 10 am - 6 pm.