Photograph by Paul Myers
Saratoga resident Chris Redford opened Just a Kid Again, a vintage toy store, at 20605 Third St. in January.
Just a Kid Again--a toy store, but clearly not just for kids
By Rebecca Ray
Chris Redford traded the future for the past. About six years ago, the Saratoga resident quit the cutting-edge computer industry. Now, she runs a vintage toy store.
Redford opened Just a Kid Again, a store at 20605 Third St., which sells vintage dolls, toys, books and games, on Jan. 25. When customers browse through the store, they encounter, among other things, old toy cars, Smurfs figurines, a Welcome Back, Kotter board game, Valentines from the early 1900s and shelves upon shelves of dolls.
"I love hearing it when people walk in and say, 'I had that! Oh, I remember these!'" Redford said. "It's a kick. So many people say it's like walking into their past and it's like a different world."
In fact, the customers' feelings of revisiting their childhoods are what prompted Redford to give the store its name. "It's for adults, really--collectors, people who just like to have a little piece of their childhood sitting around," she said.
As diverse as Redford's merchandise is, she says that so far she's sold a little of everything. Her goods range in age from a set of jackstraws from 1891--jackstraws are like pickup sticks, except that a magnet is used to pick them up--to Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. However, she says, what they all have in common is that regular toy stores no longer sell them.
Although Just a Kid Again is Redford's first store, she has always wanted to own a store. Even when she'd have yard sales, her husband, Rob Redford, a vice president of marketing for Cisco Systems, would refer to it as "playing store," she says. However, before she began to collect dolls about four years ago, she thought maybe she'd own a bookstore.
Chris has always loved dolls, and still owns three dolls from her childhood. But once Rob introduced her to eBay, he inadvertently ignited what he affectionately refers to as an "obsession" for collecting dolls, she says. And Chris' passion escalated from there. She now has some 200 or 300 dolls at home. And this doesn't count the dolls she sells from her store, half of which are from her personal collection.
Chris' newfound hobby of collecting didn't stop with dolls. As she hit garage and estate sales, she also became fond of vintage toys, and not just ones that reminded her of her childhood, which she describes as "fantastic." She also fell in love with toys that were around before she was born.
"I think older toys are the best," she said.
Chris added that when she first started to think about opening a store, she thought, "You know, I want to do it all. I don't want to just concentrate on dolls."
One of Chris' favorite parts of running the store is hearing customers' stories about their collections.
Redford also loves to see the items people bring in that she's tempted to buy. Although much of her inventory is from home, she says that consignors have already brought over toy cars and trucks and tin toys.
Even now, Chris says, she runs out of room, so she would like to expand the store. She also says she would like to learn how to restore dolls and open a doll hospital as part of her toy store.
Chris opened her store purely for fun. She says that so far, her business, which relies on a niche market of collectors, has been about what she predicted--slow during the week, but good on weekends.
Even though Chris' business is tucked off the main street of Big Basin Way, she says her store is in the perfect spot--it's less than five minutes from home, it's downtown and her youngest son, a freshman at Saratoga High, can stop by after school.
Chris, who spent 11 or 12 years working in the computer industry, says there is "absolutely no comparison" between her old and new careers.
"There's a lot of work involved here, but it's fun work," Chris said. "What better job can you have than to surround yourself with the stuff you really love?"
Saratoga, California Since 1955
