Today we’d like to introduce you to April Gabriel.
April, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
Opened in 2013, Boston General Store began as a small online retailer, established as a venue for promoting products in my spare time that were created simply but made to last a lifetime. The shop also allowed me the opportunity to pay tribute to one the person who taught me that not everything had to be disposable; my Nanna.
I was raised in Houston, Texas, but my childhood was marked by unforgettable summers spent in the Berkshires with my Nanna. She was a strong, seemingly magical, woman who revealed to me the value of life’s simple pleasures. The most gratifying days spent with her were when we waded through raspberry bushes, wearing the same old, tattered chambrays we used every year, filling mason jars connected at the waist with fruit. We picked until our hands were smudged red and we couldn’t carry anymore.
Equally lasting are the memories of the pots and pans we used to make the jam in her perfectly laid out kitchen later in the day. These were pots and pans she had my entire life and some of which still exist in my mother’s kitchen today. The goal of Boston General Store is to capture that spirit of how my grandmother lived, by purveying functional, high-quality goods, crafted by makers from around the world who share the same dedication for moving passed the generation of disposability.
Just as traditional general stores of years passed did, I also hope to develop a connection with the communities we serve. These traits once played large roles in places like the Western Massachusetts town my grandparents built their families in, but today have all but disappeared.
Boston General Store aims to bring them back.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I don’t think owning and running a small business is ever a smooth road. There are unique and new challenges every day and the key is to be flexible enough to adjust to the changes. Not everything I do is going to work and I have to be ready to scrap it and start fresh.
The struggle I face at the moment is how to keep the shop hopping when we are having crazy weather and people aren’t thinking about shopping as much.
Please tell us about Boston General Store.
I think what sets our shop apart is that we find unique brands that are made beautifully and responsibly. It could be really easy to find cheap products that aren’t made well and people have to replace in a few months. These are the products we usually see in large box stores. They sell thousands of items with the marketing ploy that they are “affordable”. But when you look at the life cycle of the product its not affordable because you have to replace it every few months.
This disposable lifestyle has really taken over and we have been working to change that mentality. The idea that you pay a little more when first purchase the item but it lasts a lot longer and doesn’t have to be replaced in a few months. My love of this idea started with my Nanna. I have a lot of products that were passed down from her to my mom and then to me. I use the same pots that I remember using with her as a child.
Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
Surprising I get asked this question a lot. My Nanna had a farm-sized raspberry patch at her home. I would spend every summer with her and we would suit up in the same chambray shirts and tie jars around our waist. Then we would hop on the path and start working on picking. It would take us about a week to get all the ripe raspberries and it the best memory I had of childhood with her.
After we had a day of wading through the patch we would sit on her porch sorting through the raspberries and talking about life. I just loved the simplicity of that life. My mom took stalks from her patch and I took some from my mom’s patch so I have 3rd generation raspberries that I hope to pass on to my son.
Contact Info:
- Address: 305 Harvard Street Brookline, MA 02446
626 High Street Dedham, MA 02026 - Website: http://www.bostongeneralstore.com
- Phone: 617-232-0103
- Email: info@bostongeneralstore.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bostongeneralstore/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bostongeneralstore
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/bgeneralstore
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/boston-general-store-brookline
- Other: https://www.pinterest.com/BOSgeneralstore/
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