NEWBURYPORT — The downtown has a variety of stores and businesses.
Alongside the boutiques and speciality shops are two group stores — businesses that have a variety of vendors selling merchandise inside the space — Flukes and Finds and Friends on State Street and The Cottage in Market Square.
The merchandise is a mix — from candles and soaps, to jewelry and pocketbooks, artwork or furniture. Customers can find mirrors, ceramics, figurines or even books and clothes. Merchandise can run from a few dollars to a few hundred dollars.
Flukes and Finds and Friends opened in Newburyport about 18 years ago. Ten women are involved in the store, now located on the upper end of State Street close to the Port Tavern. With five different vendors, shoppers can browse from all kinds of goods — from soap and linens, to crafts and jewelry, furniture, lamps, artwork and custom-made signs.
Prices vary, depending on what the customer wants, and that, said Cindy Diorio, is a draw.
"We have great prices and great people," she said yesterday.
Joan Brown of Salem has been a long-time customer of the store. "You've always been fun," she told Diorio and Ellen Thurlow, who were working behind the counter yesterday.
"We have regulars who have been coming in for years," Thurlow said.
Once an item is found, Diorio said, it's gone, meaning the merchandise on sale changes quickly. "Customers love that," she said. "We have people who come in daily. It changes daily."
The Cottage opened in Newburyport two years ago — one year after opening its first location in Amesbury. When its next-door neighbor, The Pumpkin Patch, vacated their downtown space, owner Doreen Bagley saw it as a prime chance to expand. It now has the largest retail space in Market Square and held an expansion celebration over the weekend to celebrate the occasion.
Customers browsed through the large selection that includes a wide variety of merchandise. That included: a round table for $159, place mats for $35, earrings for $18 and a doily for $3. An Avon turkey figurine was priced at $5. Artwork sells for $189. Ponytail holders are marked at $10, headbands are $7 and a toe ring goes for $4. A restored cabinet is being sold for $425. A bench sells for $89. There are note cards, paintings and photographs. There are candle holders and potpourri holders, wine bottle holders and recipe card holders.
Bagley described the shop as "a multi-dealer shop," where vendors rent space and it's considered a co-op. Everyone who works at the shop has merchandise there, she said, and they take turns working the shifts.
Artisans, dealers, decorators and a furniture restorer are among the 22 vendors in the store. The shop specializes in finding discarded furniture, or furniture that someone is throwing out, and taking it to restore, Bagley said.
By running a co-op shop, Bagley said, everyone is invested together.
"Everyone has a piece of the pie," she says. While all the vendors may like to have their own shop, she said, on their own, no one could have the prime location in Market Square that now together they do. Together, they run it, she said.
"It's not an overwhelming process for anyone."
At one time, Bagley said, Newburyport was full of these type of stores, and the unique shops and offerings were a draw for locals and tourists.
"They love it because of the variety," she says.
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