Capitola Village Articles

Bruce's Backdoor

So here's the truth: I'm a guy who hates to shop. But I love Capitola Village. Doesn't make sense? I'll explain.

Capitola Village has those old-fashioned service-oriented shopkeepers. About a year ago I got smart and took them a list of birthday/holiday gifts I need every year and let them do the work for me. Gone are the days of going to overcrowded, impersonal malls only to buy the gifts my wife was sure to return and my children were sure to relegate to some back-closet shelf.

Yvonne'snow keeps a card on my wife – her favorite colors, sizes, styles of clothing and accessories. The lingerie Yvonne selected for our anniversary looked so sexy on my wife that it was really a gift for me as well! Pacific Gallery features local artists and the seaside motifs that my niece prefers, so the owner's birthday selection fit my niece's style. My grand-daughter lives in shoes we used to call flip-flops and wore only to the beach, so when the owner of Hot Feet selected a rinestone hot-pink polka-dotted pair for her Christmas gift, I got called “hip” along with the thank-you kiss from my favorite 11-year-old.

With the pressure of my new-found “hip” image to live up to, I took a photo of my college-age grandson into the Big Kahuna, where the staff pulled out a dozen easy-care Hawaiian shirts the clerk said would “work with his coloring”, whatever that means. “Oh no, I hate choices,” I explained, so she put one shirt in a gift bag and handed me the bill. Whew, just the way I like my shopping. My grandson loved the shirt as much as the card that said the sales clerk thought he was “quite a hunk” (which I do know the meaning of).

The Craft Galleryand its Annex have made Christmas fun for me again. Last year I went in with my list of every gift I needed to mail out of town. The manager there already had a card about my wife's favorite jewelry makers and styles. So I called ahead with this instruction: “$200 limit, wrap it gorgeous.” I took all the other shipping addresses with me when I went in to pick up that gift, and all I had to say was “candle sticks to Texas, ornament to Arizona, stained glass to Minnesota.” They gift-wrapped it and shipped it all for me!

Under the Christmas tree, my gifts used to be the most unattractive ones before Capitola Village merchants saved me from gift-wrapping disaster. Super Silver and The Sally Bookman Gallery are just two of the shops owned by local artists, so the little aesthetic touches surrounding my purchases aren't neglected. Thomas Kinkead Gallery is popular, too.

So all you folks who think you hate shopping, use my key to easy backdoor gift-buying in Capitola Village!

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