Selection, Service Are What Lures Some Buyers

It’s 11 days before Christmas, and the business is brisk at department stores, at warehouse discounters and in cyberspace. But there’s a holiday shopping alternative out there where the attraction isn’t necessarily price or convenience, but a unique selection and the kind of personal attention that is as hard to come by as a parking space at the major malls this time of year.

Small San Fernando Valley specialty stores, whose owners pride themselves on their ability to offer unusual merchandise along with old-fashioned customer service, say they are enjoying a banner sales season along with almost everyone else in retailing. Bucking the bargain-hunting, one-click-buys-all mentality that has forced other independently owned shops off Ventura Boulevard and onto the World Wide Web, these businesses say they are succeeding because they offer an increasingly rare shopping experience.

A Adele’s II, a family-owned gift store here, the store competes by offering to personalize all the items it sells.

“It’s not what we carry but what we do with it that matters,” co-owner Jerry Hurwitz said.

For 25 Christmases, Hurwitz and his wife, Doris, have stocked such standard items as Lucite trays, wooden jewelry boxes, ceramic clocks and leather photo albums.

While the store does steady business year-round from customers looking for baby, bar mitzvah and anniversary gifts, the holiday season is its busiest. Behind the counter, one of his three staff artists rushed to inscribe a stack of children’s director’s chairs and umbrellas so they would be dry before opening time the next day, while a pair of gift wrappers swaddled customers’ purchases in the extravagant exteriors that have become one of the store’s signatures.

“Their idea of gift wrapping at Macy’s is to hand you a box,” Hurwitz said. “I hear it from customers day in and day out: ‘I come to you just because the wrapping is so good.’ ”

Service also counts at Northridge Pharmacy and its sister store, the Gift Gallery.

“The way we can compete is we offer people a fun, interesting place to shop and good products at competitive prices,” said Shirley Pascal, who with her husband, Barry, owns the stores. Besides candles, jewelry and cosmetics, the two shops specialize in brand-name holiday collectibles, although they are also selling plenty of the $3.95 ornaments they fashioned out of empty Viagra and Prozac bottles as a joke gift this year.

“There are a few things we sell where there will be a small price difference from a chain. But what are you getting for those few dollars more? You are getting the fact that when you come in, someone greets you, you are getting a free gift wrap, and you are getting me to ship your gift for you, if you need it shipped,” Pascal said.

Woodland Hills resident Judy Rothman, who describes herself as an avid shopper who is just as likely to patronize a mall as a small mom-and-pop shop, agrees there is something special about patronizing an independently owned store.

“You just can’t beat the selection at some of these little stores. I remember when I first moved here, I needed a day bed and when I was driving down Ventura Boulevard I found a store that sold just day beds. I always thought that was a wonderful thing,” Rothman said. “Unfortunately, there are very, very few of these unique stores left.”

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Although it’s true that specialty stores like Adele’s II and the Gift Gallery are becoming harder to find in this era of e-commerce and big box discounters, that has left an important niche to fill for those that remain.

Shosha Marie Bottoms, the buyer for Angel City Yoga, a 10-year-old yoga studio in Studio City, says that while her customers could easily purchase the incense, books, essential oils and hand-painted T-shirts she stocks elsewhere, “They see spending their money here as being true to the community, and buy from us out of allegiance.”

Loyalty has also been an important element to the success of Oh Fancy That, a 3-year-old stall in the Valley Indoor Swap Meet that offers British foods, newspapers and gifts. Owner Jean Karsek says that as an ex-pat Brit, she knows what her customers like and she remains true to their traditional passions.

In addition to a wide selection of teas and teapots, Paddington bears, Cadbury chocolates and aprons and towels fashioned of Ulster linen, Karsek says she is selling a lot of “millennium crackers,” a twist on the Christmas day tradition of the foot-long crackers the British crack open like wishbones, revealing jokes or tiny gifts inside.

“There is a huge British community in Southern California, so I cater to them,” Karsek said.

The appeal of finding gifts they can’t find anywhere else also draws mall-weary customers in search of a little inspiration to Iguana, a retro clothing store on Ventura Boulevard in Sherman Oaks.

Amid the racks of vintage bowling and Hawaiian print shirts are new zoot suits, two-toned shoes and reversible “Japan jackets,” which feature dragons embroidered on velvet on one side and tigers or devils on the satin flip side.

“People are happy. They find what they want here because it is different,” manager Sheila Cohn said. “And it’s not just kids. Doctors, lawyers, everyone comes in.”

Down the street at Handmade, a Sherman Oaks artisans gallery and imports store featuring the wares of more than 150 vendors, Far East-flavored gifts, ranging from $6 Buddha figurines to $12 Chinese bead bracelets, are proving to be big sellers.

“What’s really hot right now is we have these lucky bamboo plants in Oriental pots,” sales clerk Lisa King said. “It’s a nice gift for that person you don’t know what to buy for; plus, people think if they buy it it will bring that person good luck.”

According to King, shoppers who wander into Handmade are usually surprised to find the prices to be competitive, and often cheaper, than they would find in a mall or over the Internet.

“People have this idea that if you are getting something that was handmade by an artist, it’s going to be really expensive. But a lot of our prices are reasonable compared to a lot of other boutiques and even dot-com,” she said.

Those who love giving handmade gifts and those who love the idea but lack the time or talent to do it themselves are also making for a healthy sales season at Needle World, a 23-year-old knitting and crochet store on Woodman Avenue in Sherman Oaks. Owner Lynn Foster, who until 5 p.m. Wednesday will be accepting orders for custom-made scarves and purses, said she is having “an unusually good Christmas, which I am glad to see, since last Christmas was really disappointing.”

Foster says she knows that her customers are feeling optimistic about the economy because it is her higher-priced merchandise--the $20-a-ball yarn, the $30 skeins of silk ribbon and $200 antique handbag frames--that are really moving.

“My customers are not as afraid to spend this year,” Foster said.

Foster also provides a space where needleworkers can get help with their projects from a part-time staff of nimble-fingered women.

“There aren’t many stores like mine. I’m not like a discount store, where there is one on every block,” she said. At the same time, the landlord who has kept her rent reasonable, and the fact that she doesn’t rely on the store as her sole source of income have helped too, she said.

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David Esser, owner of the Gym for the Mind game store in Woodland Hills, is the first to admit there is nothing unusual about what he sells, which this year is primarily Pokemon trading cards. Where Esser thinks he has an edge is how he sells them.

“With every deck, we give a lesson on how to play the Pokemon game,” he says. Esser is such a fan of Pokemon that he has pretty much given up on selling chess and backgammon boards and turned his store into a place where Pokemon collectors can walk in to play and trade 13 hours a week.

“I guess I have a monopoly on the people who hate the malls,” he said.