What are the store's workers so happy about? The store brought in more than $100,000 during the past fiscal year.

Considering the store's workers won't see a penny of that, one might wonder why they're celebrating--but there's no wiping the smiles off these ladies' faces. They couldn't be happier, because all the money goes to charity.

The Echo Shop is a second-hand store that sells donated items such as clothing, household items and knick-knacks, and gives all proceeds to local charities. The store first opened its doors in the Village in the mid-1960s, the brainchild of a group of women at the local St. Andrew's Episcopal Church who wanted a way to raise money for local charities.

Karen Delong, a loyal volunteer since 1991, says that back then the average monthly sales were around $400--so it's easy to see how much the store has grown. Delong says she couldn't be more proud of the store's recent sales milestone, not only because it is the largest amount of money it has ever raised in a single year, but because she knows it was during hard economic times.

"The Village is struggling to keep the small businesses going. Before the earthquake of 1998, Big Basin Way was a busy place. After Los Gatos started rebuilding, it seemed that sleepy Saratoga started fading away," says Delong, who just finished a year-long stint as the store's manager. "But The Echo Shop has survived the economic ups and downs, and continues to grow. We met our goal [of $100,000 in sales] with hard work, yard sales, two week-long sales, $5 bag day sales and numerous special, monthly marketing campaigns."

Delong says the store ended the fiscal year on June 30 with a grand total of $103,000.

Perhaps it is some of the rare finds that keep customers coming back month after month. While most of the store's sale items are "nearly new," as the volunteers like to call them, Delong and Wilma Head, an Echo Shop volunteer for nearly 20 years, say they sometimes can't believe some of the new and valuable items local families will donate to the store.

"Just recently, someone donated a John Hardy bracelet they got at Neiman Marcus," Head says. "It's beautiful; it's woven gold and silver."

"I went on eBay, and found out it's worth over $800," Delong adds.

Delong says the store plans to sell the bracelet for around $500.

Delong says one of the store's other recent jackpots is an original, 1920s painting that is signed by the artist.

Items such as these, which come in all the time, are why customers such as Arlene Palaima of Saratoga come in several times a week.

"They get new things in every day. So this is what I save my spending money for," Palaima says. "They're such pretty things, and at the right price. Plus, the people are extremely pleasant and helpful."

Palaima says she can hardly believe the name-brand clothing and quality household items that she can find at The Echo Shop for rock-bottom prices. Just last week, she says she found two Alfred Dunner blazers on the racks--brand new. In a department store, Palaima says the blazers would normally go for about $50 to $70 each. At The Echo Shop, they were only $6. She says she also found a beautiful oil painting for only 50 cents that she now has hanging in her home.

Palaima says she loves to get her exercise by walking the mile and a half from her house on Saratoga Avenue to the shop a few times a week, to check out the new finds.

"The store is so quaint, and I just find the cutest things," she says. "There's a lot of treasures in here."

Speaking of treasures, Head says she found one of her own when she visited a local mission in San Jose to see how the money and items donated by The Echo Shop were put to use.

"It was such an eye-opener," Head says. Head and Delong say the mission takes in people from off the streets and helps them get back on their feet.

"When they get ready to leave the mission, they give them things like household items, towels, clothes--things to get their household going again," Delong explains. "So we try to give them a lot of different things."

Head says The Echo Shop gets requests from many different agencies, and twice a year it assesses need and awards various grants. This year, The Echo Shop made donations to Bay and Valley Habitat for Humanity; Concern for the Poor Feeding Program; Contact, a crisis hotline; Correctional Institutions Chaplaincy of Santa Clara County; the Family Education Foundation; Friends Outside, an organization that supports those with a family member in prison; A Family Place, which offers educational opportunities for women and children; the Georgia Travis Center for low-income and homeless women; Next Door, which fights domestic violence; Our Daily Bread, the feeding program at St. Thomas' Episcopal Church in Sunnyvale; the San Jose Family Shelter; the Santa Maria Urban Mission; the Saratoga Adult Day Care Center; Star House, an alternative to juvenile hall for children; and Transitional Housing for battered women and children.

All in all, the women who volunteer at The Echo Shop are mighty proud of their accomplishment--and they hope next year will be even better.

"Come visit us," Delong says. "We operate in a small space, but we are mighty."

The Echo Shop is located at 14477 Big Basin Way in Saratoga, next to the International Coffee Exchange. Call 408.867.3995.