Etsy Incarnate: Pure Gifts Mount Pleasant , SC

Etsy Incarnate: Pure Gifts Mount Pleasant

Having spent much of her life working in corporate positions, Carol fell in love with Etsy when she was introduced to it several years ago.  She has always been interested in American made (her father having worked in a steel mill) and eco-friendly products, and when life took an unexpected turn for her last summer, she decided it was time to do something different.

Pure Gifts Mount Pleasant has been curated almost entirely from Etsy, with an emphasis on local vendors but they do carry products from all over the States.  The goal of the store is to be there for today’s buyer – in the most literal sense – the guy who forgot his girlfriend’s present at 6:00 on their anniversary.  Pure Gifts will stay open late, offer gift wrapping, and have unique products so it never looks like it’s a last minute gift.

So why is handmade important to Carol?  She and I had a lengthy and wonderful discussion on this topic.  I missed the 60′s and 70′s, when there was a similar handmade movement, but Carol shared with me her thoughts and she made an excellent point.  In that time period, a LOT of people still did handmade crafts.  Fathers taught their sons how to build things and work on cars; mothers taught their daughters to sew.  As a society as a whole, we’re losing touch with some of our roots in that very few people still have these skills.  So for Carol, it’s a question of supporting those who still do take the time to preserve these crafts.

On that note, a major difference between Carol and some of the other boutiques I’ve dealt with is her insistence on supporting her vendors 100%.  She doesn’t care if you sell online or in shows, and in fact, she has asked every vendor to contribute to a vendor book so that she can give customers all the information they could ever want about her artists and craftspeople.  For example, I sell stationery in stores, but not invitations, so she wanted to be able to show them some of my invitations if someone by chance comes in who needs them.  And by the same token, you can be sure that I tell everyone I know about her and her incredible endeavor.  Pure Gifts is truly a community store.

It’s like a dream come true: Etsy in a store I can visit, touch, see, smell, and hear.

Find out more about Pure Gifts at their website

Sarah Early is the co-editor of Handmadeology. She is the full time graphic designer behind dodeline design and also blogs daily at The Quirky Designer.