We have hundreds consignors selling with us now and lots of new stuff coming in each week. That adds up to a huge number of reasons to stay in touch with us on Facebook.

Here’s how it works. On the same day each month we are choosing a winner at random for the $50 gift card. So that means if you become a fan and stay a fan of ours, you get the chance to win not just once, but every month. And $50 goes a loooooooong way at a consignment shop.  The first winner will be chosen this Friday, March 19.

There are other reasons to be on Facebook, too, not the least of which is making sure you don’t get left behind in this crazy new social media driven world. We encourage you to have fun with us: write on the Peonies wall, post photos, ask questions, comment away.

BTW, feel free to friend us, Pam Williams and Laurel Peters. (Maybe send us a note with your friend request and tell us you’re a Peonista so we don’t think you’re a some wacko stalker, k?).

~ Pam and Laurel

Oooh, you’re going to love Peonies.

We love chatting with customers and friends, even when we’re not together in the shop. Join Peonies on Facebook and when you do, special offers and fun stuff will start coming your way.

Feel free to upload photos, write a comment on the wall, post a link you think you think everyone should know about.  It is a great way to shout it all out so we can help you share it. Which we love doing. Hope to see you there!

Oh, and if you have any doubt about the power of Facebook, you might be curious to know that it is more powerful in directing web traffic than google. Google! Don’t miss out on what’s going on.

~ Pam and Laurel

Did you happen to catch Women in Business with Nell Merlino and Rhiannon Ally on Better this week? Rhiannon asked Nell how business owners can thrive. It’s a great interview, offering entrepreneurs solid thinking:

#1: Do you have something people really want to buy, not just what others think will do well?

#2: What problem are you solving for customers, and how do you envision your product being sold?

#3: Ask for help!

#4: Make friends with your financial information; understand how you are making $ and how you are losing it.

#5: Go after it! Failure is not final. Learn from your mistakes and move forward.

Part of the segment was filmed at Peonies consignment shop, and owners Pam Williams and Laurel Peters were interviewed. You can watch the video here.

The event is an annual fundraiser for The Child & Family Agency given by The Essex River Valley Auxiliary — an organization whose staff and volunteers assist children and families-at-risk locally with programs that deal with the prevention of child abuse, the treatment of family violence, teen pregnancy, children’s health care, childcare, parent education and children’s mental health. The Essex Holiday House tour takes place Saturday, December 12, 2009, from 10am to 4pm. See all events CFA events here. Ticket info here.

This discount card, which offers some incredible discounts, is the brainchild of Erica Tannen, the e-list. We like it for three reasons: the great discounts for shoppers, the incentive to ‘buy local’ and that the cards help give back—10% of the proceeds of the sale of each e-card is donated to a local non-profit organization. The card gets you tons of great deals, some are special offers for first-time customers.

See who is participating by category, here.

See what’s available by town, here.

Purchase the e-card at Peonies, or directly from Erica, here.

~ Pam and Laurel

Maggie graduated from the University of Connecticut with a degree in Management Information Systems (IT) and a concentration in Marketing. (We can’t wait until she’s ready to take over all of our IT and our marketing!) Maggie began her career at CIGNA Retirement and Investments. When CIGNA sold her division, it freed her to pursue a more creative side.

Maggie then became a mixologist, and eventually head bartender at the Wine Bar at the Griswold Inn in Essex.  During that time she also worked at Fromage, the wonderful gourmet food and cheese shop in Old Saybrook. Wonderful customers and friends who knew Maggie from the Gris and Fromage introduced her to the next step in her career: Maggie was hired to open and become the general manager of Liv’s Oyster Bar. Through Liv’s, Maggie met Julius Angelini, owner of Angelini Wine, and found the next stop on her career path, enabling her to realize her marketing and design skills. She loves working with people and takes great satisfaction from helping customers.

Maggie lives in Old Saybrook with her husband, Scott Lukas. In her spare time, Maggie loves to read and practices yoga.  Please join us in welcoming Maggie to Peonies.

~ Pam and Laurel

Peonies, the high end consignment store in Centerbrook, CT, unveils its Fall 09 Collection today, Tuesday, September 15. The shop has been open since May 29, 2009.

Owners Laurel Peters and Pam Williams say that women have embraced the shopping experience at Peonies, located just three miles from elegant Essex Village. Half of the store traffic includes loyal customers, lovingly referred to by the owners as Peonistas—women who come into Peonies at least once a week to to check out what’s new.

This week, the Peonistas will see 500+ new, one of a kind items in the shop. Cooler weather clothing and accessories are now on the floor with a wide range of fine sweaters, jackets, lightweight scarves, tops, skirts, suits and light coats, cleanly organized by type and color. The owners say they turned the store “upside down” over the weekend to make room for all of the new Fall arrivals including designers like Alberto Makali, David Meister, Chanel, Ralph Lauren, Donna Ricco and more.

For a sneak preview of the Peonies Fall 09 Collection, look here.

To see what the store looks like right now, look below.

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PEONIES FALL 09 | Click on photo to enlarge

Many of the ideas for stories for Better come directly from viewers. When Essex resident Dianne Hunt-Mason watched Better a few weeks ago, she heard them ask, “What’s new in your town?”

Dianne recalls, “I thought, well, there is something new in my town, and so I just started tapping away on my computer, writing about Peonies and all of the things I love about it.” Dianne, a Peonies consignor and customer, apparently intrigued the show’s producers with her note: within weeks a friendly Channel 3 crew showed up at our store with cameras and questions. Lucky us: our customers were happy to share their perspectives: Dianne, Noemi Kearns, and Amy Friedman—thank you, thank you.

Because our customers loooove to spread the word, Peonies will be featured on Better Connecticut on Tuesday, September 15  at 10am on Channel 3, coinciding with the launch of their new Fall season, and the first day we present our new Fall collection.

How lucky are we? Please tune in!

~ Pam and Laurel

PS.  Scott= and Kara have a terrific Facebook page. Follow them! And send your love to Kara and her new baby boy, Julian Crescenzi Stephen House!

~ Pam and Laurel

As we mentioned in an earlier post, Peonies was featured last Friday in the ShoreLine Times (Vol. 2 No. 28, Friday July 3, 2009).

The feature on Peonies was the second story in a two-part series on consignment shops, written and photographed by Barbara Douglas {the first story ran the week prior.} We especially loved one particular quote, so we’re putting it here in a second color to underscore how very much we loved it, “Upon entering Peonies, any preconceived notion of ‘consignment’ goes out the window the second you step in the door.”  

Our special thanks to the ShoreLine Times for a green light to share the story here. If you want to read the story in larger type, download the pdfs at the end of the post. 

Oh, oooooooh—just remembered! You absolutely must download the first pdf if only for the amazing Smoky Bacon Salad recipe shared by Deb Harris from Debbie Moose’s New Book “Potato Salad” 2009. We agree with Deb that the very very best potato salad is made at least a little ahead of time to let the flavors marry. Yum. We also think anything with bacon, well, you just can’t go wrong!

 ~ Pam and Laurel 

ShoreLine Times, Vol. 2, No. 28, Section B, 1

ShoreLine Times, Vol.2, No. 28, Section B, p2

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Barbara Douglas, who wrote the story and took all the photographs, spent over an hour and a half with us doing due diligence: inspecting merchandise, taking photographs and asking questions.

The story broke on Friday and the shop was non-stop busy all day.  Though we had planned to be closed, we opened Peonies on the Fourth of July from 10-3pm so as not to disappoint customers who had read the story.

We couldn’t be more pleased with Barbara’s piece. It was the second story in a two-part series on thrift and consignment shops.

Unfortunately, the two-page feature is not available online via the ShoreLine Times. We’re hoping to get a PDF to share with you. For now, read an excerpt, here.

In the meantime, Barbara was kind enough to share a few shots with us!

~ Pam and Laurel

© Photos by Barbara Douglas

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Everything is organized by article type, then by color.

Dresses {yes, we have Lilly} are in a dedicated section.

Customers love pairing black and whites together, so we do it for them.

White blouses, a staple for any closet, hang together like privates lined up at attention…

Silk scarves are folded. {We cannot imagine why no one’s nabbed the Furla!}

Jeans are organized by size. {Did we mention we have a thing for ties? Yes, we love ties for belts. Think we should submit it as an ‘Aha! use‘ in Real Simple magazine?}

‘Special’ handbags like Gucci, Ghurka, Stuart Weitzman and Furla are on on display.

Other colorful leather handbags bring pop to other display areas.

We feature pieces that make us smile, like this poppy red Dana Buchman suit….

…and this fantastic little Hawaiian print number by Dolce & Gabbana!

{We love this chartreuse Carlisle on our 1940’s vintage wire dress form.}

Here you can see half of the store in the antique mirror, adorned by a sweet Tibi sundress*.

OK, ok, pulling back with our fabulous little pink Sony Cyber-shot…click!!! Here you can see a little more of the store. So, dear readers, that’s how Peonies is organized and why. Come on in and see us soon.

~ Pam and Laurel

*The ‘butterfly dress’ was designed by Tibi, a chic designer label that sells in places like Saks, Henri Bendel, Neiman Marcus, Bloomingdales, Net-a-Porter, Harvey Nichols, Harrods and Scoop. Consignor No. 7 discovered this dress in a little boutique in San Francisco. The dress sold in a week: which is to say that the beautiful blooms at Peonies don’t last long!

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There was a similar story that night about the growing trend on the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric, reported by Kelly Cobialla. The piece said “clothes swapping is the new shopping.” You can read or watch Kelly’s insightful story here.

This is great news for Peonies, the higher end resale store for women. Our consignment boutique, located just a few miles from historic Essex Village in Connecticut, is well-positioned to thrive. The 800 square-foot boutique is stocked with upscale designers brands such as Michael Kors, Dolce & Gabbana, Giorgio Armani, Lilly Pulitzer, Stuart Weitzman, Vera Wang and Vertigo. 

Women love bargains, for sure. But they also love another green!

In fact, Peonies customers are telling us they see consignment as a genuine path to sustainability. Consignors are trading in their gently-used clothing as another way to help save on the global energy required to manufacture clothes. By consigning, the lifecycle of a great garment is extended for at least another generation. And if that piece is of ‘heirloom quality’, the lifecycle of a great Anne Klein suit or a Chanel jacket is extended even further. 

~ Pam and Laurel 

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