In the fall of 2011, my sister-in-law and I started GOEDvanToen.
It would become a webshop where both vintage finds and new 'retro' children's clothing would be 'on the shelves' together.
My sister-in-law had a webshop full of vintage finds and wanted to sell nice retro children's clothing because we both loved that for our children. She would run the webshop. I would only help with the purchasing and photography 😅🙈
We were looking for a name for the new store where all items would be available under one roof...
GOEDvanThen was born!
clothingGOOD, tablewareGOOD, toys, beddingGOOD and everything with a big fat nod to THEN.
However, it turned out that the execution was not as simple as we thought. A vintage glass of € 2, - could only be sent as a package and a t-shirt of € 25, - would then have the same (high) shipping costs (making a distinction was not yet possible in the standard webshop with which we started).
So we started with 2 different web shops, which my sister-in-law ran from Groningen.
The clothing part grew faster than the vintage finds and that's how we decided that I would do the clothing part from Amsterdam because it was a bit too much for her, with a baby of half a year, to run both shops. My baby was already a toddler and was running around...
And so the stock moved to Amsterdam in the first weeks of 2012. And suddenly I had a webshop. Oops! What started as a joke suddenly became very serious. I had never had the ambition to start a webshop. I was happy to only concern myself with purchasing and photography 😅
But it went differently and before I knew it I had a more than full-time job. (Running a webshop is intensive). And I also opened a store in 2014 😅 (What was I thinking!)
Duns Sweden, Smafolk, Maxomorra & AlbaBaby were there from the very beginning.
In the early years, the emphasis was on the nod to the past, a nice retro sauce, but fair & sustainably produced, now it is the other way around. Sustainable and fair production in any case, and then occasionally something that may have a nod to THEN, but it no longer has to. Preferably timeless, so that it is truly sustainable and full of inspiration for the world of tomorrow.
