Goldie G's--a business that would make Goldie G. proud
By Shari Kaplan
For the past five and a half years, whenever Timeless Skin Spa owner Jill Höyer gave people directions to her shop, at 346 N. Santa Cruz Ave., she always said, "It's next to the Los Gatos Cafe."
Since Feb. 1, however, she says something else: "It's right in back of Goldie G's!" The new directions are a result of Höyer's new business venture, a bath-and-body boutique she opened in front of Timeless Skin Spa and named in memory of her grandmother, Goldie Geraldine--the original "Goldie G."
"She was very dedicated to customer service and really exceeded the norm. She went out of her way to help her customers," Höyer says of her grandmother. Together with Höyer's grandfather, "Goldie G" ran the 120-year-old Boxrud Company--a sundry business--in Red Wing, Minn., in the '60s and '70s.
Höyer says her grandmother was a woman of style and creative vision who wanted life to be "more than ordinary." Since many of Timeless Skin Spa's clients also fit that description, Höyer decided the boutique would be a natural complement to Timeless Skin Spa, which provides facials, fruit acid peels, aromatherapy, make-up application, massage and body hair waxing.
While waiting for the availability of the storefront Goldie G's now occupies, Höyer says she did at least a year's worth of research on what products to carry and what manufacturers to use. She sampled most of the products herself, too.
"It was like Christmas every day; I was always getting products in the mail!" she recalls, chuckling. "I didn't want to just order things from one catalog. I wanted to try them all."
The result of her eclectic tastes are reflected in her merchandise, which includes French milled soaps, bath salts mixed with dried flowers and sold by the scoop, buckwheat pillows, teabags for the eyes, aromatherapy inhalers, herbal body wraps, scented linen water, natural shaving products for men and many types of candles--the traditional kind as well as those made with soy, which give off less smoke.
"My eyes are always open to things that are unique," Höyer says.
There are also a few items that don't go in the bath or on the body, such as handbags, baby-changing pads and bibs, satin drawstring backpacks, jewelry, lampshades and place mats with beading done by Höyer herself, and handmade antique Damask linens imported from Denmark, where her husband's mother lives.
"We've had a very positive response to Goldie G's so far. The minute anyone comes in, they comment on the smell," Höyer says, taking a deep breath of the sweet air. "I still walk out here and go 'wow.'"
For more information on Goldie G's, call 408.395.9244.
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Los Gatos, California Since 1881
