We are home to over 150 handmade and homemade, upcycling, recycling businesses just from Saskatchewan. We’ve got everything from soup to nuts. We’ve got body care products, clothing, jams, buffalo meat, recycled clothing, sweets, treats. Something for everyone.There are little variations. There’s some vendors that are in both of the locations and some are just in one location. But it’s all still the same premise — products from Saskatchewan artisans and small businesses.Yes.
And everybody that’s in The Hobnobber is a family. We call ourselves the Hobnobber family because we support each other, we network each other. We really do work like a family, one that we choose. And one other thing that I do that I think sets us apart from everybody else, we also have a young entrepreneurs of the Hobnobber area — my youngest one is four years old — that make their own crafts, and they sell their items in the store as well. I don’t charge any rent, it’s just to help out young kids. I’ve got another girl aged 12. So I’ve got probably about eight or nine young entrepreneurs in The Hobnobbers. I just think it’s so darn cute.
Karen Reid at the original Hobnobber location when she opened in Nov., 2018, and then featured over 75 artisans from across Saskatchewan.Q: How many products do you actually sell and how many artisans are featured in each store?When I looked at it last, there were over 6,500 items in stock between the two stores. For the 33rd Street location, we’ve got 150 artisans and at Drinkle Mall right now we’ve got 50. But that will be doubling in the next month and a half, once we get the extra space.
Q: You grew up in Saskatoon. I understand there was a class you took at Mount Royal Collegiate back in 1978 that still helps you to this day at Hobnobber?I think about this a lot. When I went to Mount Royal I took a class called merchandising and so often what I learned in that class has helped me with my businesses. Go figure that something that long ago that I thought was just an easy class to take to get credits would actually come back to haunt me in a good way.