Worlds Apart: Two Indie Retailers Tap Eco Trend With Mixed Results

For a new crop of eco retailers, it’s the best of times and worst of times.

As the entire marketplace prepares to go green, two retailers on Los Angeles’ Eastside are vying for a slice of the retail quiche—with varying degrees of success—in this tale of two neighborhoods.

If an educated sales force is a retailer’s best virtue, All Shades of Green at 3038 Rowena Ave. inSilverlake is positively saintly. Nearly the entire crew of five has a degree in environmental studies. This comes in handy because the store attracts customers “interested in a lifestyle change,” said owner Liza Shtromburg. “It’s a very interactive type of place, not just a store but an educational center for all of us.”

Shtromburg sent the store, originally founded eight years ago as Islands LS, through a yearlong remodeling, reopening in September 2007 with a new name and a plan to tap the growing eco trend (or “awakening,” depending on your point of view). The store now stocks entirely eco-friendly goods, which are split across the categories of apparel and accessories, home, and beauty items.

The new green theme has been well-received by Silverlake residents, especially hip mothers who’ve shown a strong interest in childrenswear that is pesticide- and chemical-free and made from organic cotton with natural dyes. “Parents are looking for something children can wear that’s not going to go through their pores and affect them later in life,” sales clerk Bree Crane said.

All Shades of Green sells childrenswear by Ecoland, No Enemy, Speesees and Twirls and Twigs, with T-shirts priced around $23 and onesies at $30.

For grown-up clothing, a hemp sweater by Ecolution is priced at $62. A coat-length hoodie made of recycled fabrics by Rebe sells for $180, “and we can’t keep them in stock,” Crane said.

Shtromburg wants to expand the store’s apparel offerings, which currently take up about a fifth of its floor space, and admits she is still trying to nail down the neighborhood style. “We’re trying to find fashionable stuff because we have customers that want more-high-end products,” she said.

Shtromburg shopped the store’s lines mostly through Internet research, not through conventional fashion markets and trade shows.

In addition to fashion, All Shades of Green’s customers also want comfort along with their eco benefits. Bamboo tops are a favorite because of the fabric’s soft hand. But the store wants to move customers more toward hemp, which is a darker shade of green on the environmental color wheel. Bamboo is sometimes processed with harsh chemicals and is best reserved for otherapplications, such as the store’s bamboo floor. Hemp, however, is cleaner to cultivate and can only be used for apparel, not home furnishings.

But most customers find hemp garments unpleasantly rough, which is why the store is considering pre-washing items, as they do soften with laundering. “I think the main reason why bamboo is more popular is because of the way it feels,” Shtromburg said.

Then there’s the way green products feel to the customer’s conscience. All Shades of Green stocks other items to facilitate lifestyle change, such as stylish tins for getting takeout food (so you don’t need to waste a Styrofoam box) and water filters for showers and sinks to block out chlorine. The store has begun offering a combination consultation-and-referral service, helping customers locate contractors, architects and other professionals specializing in greening homes.

All Shades of Green also sponsors workshops on greening your home and on more mundane topics such as composting. “We want to effect real change,” Shtromburg said. “Several times a week, we have new customers come in and say, ’It never occurred to me to do all this.’”

A few miles away, on Colorado Boulevard in Eagle Rock, the story is different at Regeneration. Opened 18 months ago by Kelly Witmer, who previously owned Pull My Daisy in Los Angeles’ Sunset Junction neighborhood before selling it to the current owner, Regeneration shows that even in the midst of a trend, location may be the most important factor in retailing.

Witmer admits she opened the store without a clear plan, noticing the open space across from a popular pizza parlor, outside which lines often form. But she is not on a retail-driven strip of the boulevard and is “still trying to figure out what the neighborhood wants.”

One thing she knows it doesn’t want is any apparel priced over $50. Although the 1,000-square-foot shop is packed with dozens of different eco lines in the home, beauty and apparel categories (including far more clothing than All Shades of Green), “higher-priced stuff just hasn’t been selling,” Witmer said. “That’s been my main problem.” Customers balk at anything over $50, “and over $100 is pretty much impossible,” she said.

Witmer carries items by Stewart + Brown, Ecoganik, Of the Earth and Linda Loudermilk but has done best with vintage clothing she silk-screens herself and sells in the $30 range.

Like Shtromburg, from All Shades of Green, Witmer found her lines on the Internet rather than at market or trade shows, though she did consult the list of eco-friendly collections from Pooltradeshow’s eco show, S(eco)nd.

And even when customers do show an interest in a higher-priced item of clothing, sometimes they balk at where they’re made. “Most eco-friendly clothes are made in China,” Witmer said. “And a lot of customers who care about this stuff read the tags, and they won’t buy it because of that. I hear it a lot. China has such a bad rap for working conditions.”

Witmer admits her location may be the biggest reason sales are slow, and she thinks about moving to the Westside of Los Angeles, perhaps Venice. “But rents are crazy, and I talk to other independent retailers, and they’re all having a tough time right now.”