Meet Stephen and Heather Bukovsky of Hunt & Gather Vintage Market in Worcester County

Today we’d like to introduce you to Stephen and Heather Bukovsky.

So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
Heather and I have been involved with antiques since we met, back around 1994. At that time, it was an interest with buying/collecting which lead to renting out a booth space to sell our finds and then adding online selling as well. That started in N.C., after we moved from N.Y. to down south. That was in 1997. I started my full time job then working for a company. After about 10 years in the south, we started to miss the north east and that’s when we decided to move back. I was able to arrange a job transfer that put us in Massachusetts! Worked full time for another 6.5 years and then things changed drastically for us.

After 16.5 years with the company, the company reorganized and I was out of a job. It was pretty upsetting as this was our main source of income; at this point we were still enjoying antiques as a hobby. We came to the realization that we wanted to be in charge of whether we fired ourselves or not! We didn’t want to be tossed aside again for accounting paperwork to show an increase in revenue.

We decided to make our hobby our full time love. We opened a small store front in Sterling, MA and from there met a family that had property in Princeton that they would like to see changed! The building on the property was 3.5 times larger than the small space we currently had in Sterling! We jumped at the opportunity and again went all in! It was a lot of long days and nights of work to revamp things to our vision!

We were in the Sterling store for only 1 year; opportunity came and we closed that store and worked on this new scary awesome adventure. I can say awesome now but then, it was scary.

We weathered the requirements by the state/local offices and opened our store in 2015! From then, it has grown and we have been happier ever since because we have our own store, our own vision and our own future! What is equally awesome is that the building that we are in was the home of the Museum of Antique Autos that ran from around mid-1930s to the mid-1960s. A lot of great history in Princeton!

Has it been a smooth road?
Finances were tight for each store opening. To clarify, we closed the smaller store and moved everything to the larger opportunity. One year after we opened the first store, we did this. Thinking about it now as I type this, it was crazy – we weren’t sure if any of this would actually work but we knew it was a great idea and opportunity. What we did know: you fail 100% of the time if you don’t try.

Difficult building inspectors (closed our store for 2 months). Difficult engineers (fired himself from the job to get more money, which resulted in the above store closure because the building inspector and the engineer were friends).

So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Hunt & Gather Vintage Market story. Tell us more about the business.
We are a multi dealer shop! Over 40 different dealers set up with us and offer a range of items for sale!
Primitive items Vintage items Upcycled items Rustic Farmhouse, we maintain an 80/20 rule: 80% not new 20% new items. There are so many wonderful old and new decor PCs that pair well together and we want all of our customers to feel good making their house a home with our product.

What sets us apart is that we care: About our store, customers, dealers. We are not just here to collect rent from our dealers. We are here to grow a great destination for both our customers and dealers. We are here for the long term. We also have events in our function room. It is available to rent out! We also conduct our own HGVM hosted events.

We are a multi dealer shop! Over 40 different dealers set up with us and offer a range of items for sale!
Primitive items, vintage items, upcycled items, Rustic farmhouse. We maintain an 80/20 rule: 80% not new 20% new items. There are so many wonderful old and new decor PCs that pair well together and we want all of our customers to feel good making their house a home with our product.

What sets us apart is that we care: about our store, customers, dealers.

We are not just here to collect rent from our dealers. We are here to grow a great destination for both our customers and dealers. We are here for the long term.

We also have events in our function room. It is available to rent out!
We also conduct our own HGVM hosted events:
HGVM Annual Flea Stock Junkin Event: perfect event for the project find for upcyclers of any level!
HGVM Annual Mistletoe & Margarita Shopping event which was perfect for the holidays!
HGVM Annual Craft Show: Great local crafter venue for customers to find the gems in our local community.
HGVM Haunt & Gather Event: Sale event in the store and great trick or treat event to bring the kids to. We and the dealers dress up, decorate the store and hand out candy.

How do you, personally, define success? What’s you criteria, the markers you’re looking out for, etc?
Honestly, we are happy when, again and again, our customers tell us that they come here because it is their happy place. Their place where they are comfortable and get away for a while. That tells us that we succeeded in creating the warm inviting stay-awhile feeling that we wanted. That was our goal when we talked about how we wanted our store to be before we had any locations set in stone.

People congregate in our store; shop; talk; dance to the music we have playing. That has been a great marker to tell us that we are succeeding.

If people are feeling this way when they come in, they are staying and shopping and happy with their comfort purchases. That’s what we want: Hunt, gather, bring home and enjoy.

Contact Info:

• Address: 194 Worcester Road (Rt 31)
  Princeton, MA 01541
• Website: www.huntandgathervintagemarket.com
• Phone: 1-978-464-5555
• Email: stephen@verbayna.com
• Instagram: @huntandgathervm
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/huntandgathervintagemarket/

Image Credit:
Heather & Stephen Bukovsky

Getting in touch: BostonVoyager is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.