Modish Shop Tour: Little Otsu

Yay!  I'm so pleased to bring you a little tour of the brick and mortar version of one of my favorite online shops (I've featured it here many times before!), Little Otsu!  Located in San Francisco's Mission District, Little Otsu is a cute little shop selling their own paper products along with other artist goods, owned by the oh so sweet Jeremy & Yvonne who actually live here in Portland, OR!  Let's take a peek around look, shall we?  (*be sure to click "continue reading" at the break for the full tour!)

What is the name of your shop and where is it located?  How long have you been in business?
Little Otsu is located in San Francisco's Mission District on Valencia Street between 19th and 20th. We've been in business since 2002.

What sorts of items do you sell?  Who are some of the designers you carry?
Our most abundant items are from our own line of Little Otsu paper goods: planners, journals, cards, calendars, and more. We also sell a selection of goods from friends and fellow small businesses. We have illustrated books, prints and small paintings, stationery, t-shirts, handmade wallets, buttons, bags, vegan cookbooks. A sampling of the companies we carry includes Animal Sleep Stories, Mittenmaker, Studio on Fire, RandL, Edelweiss Greetings, Drawn & Quarterly, Sycamore Street Press, Big Stone Head, Honeylux, La Mano, Fugu Fugu Press, Burgundy & Brown, The Small Object, Narwhal Co., Papered Together, McSweeney's, Boygirlparty, and Zum.

What sort of mood/design aesthetic does your shop have?

Our shop is pretty casual and accessible with lots of things to engage your eyes. The store itself is relatively small, but since we're able to share the building with an office, we have the advantage of tall ceilings and a skylight that bring an airiness to the space. We were lucky to benefit from work that an architecture class was doing for our officemates--they built us a great back wall and used recycled sails to make an awesome window treatment for the skylight and those things are really clean and modern. Our store manager Kirk Snyder also just painted an impressive geometric mural that lends to that feeling. We counter that with our own hodge podge use of vintage/found/new furniture (including a family piano that we didn't have room for in our apartment). It's a good setting for our mix of products. Much like our publishing projects, our design aesthetic runs the gamut but is always centered around drawings and any sort of illustration.

What price range do you carry?
Everything in the Little Otsu catalog is under $18 and most everything else is under $40.

What do you think makes your shop stand out from the crowd and keep people coming back?

Our store is the headquarters for our publishing company, so we have things in our store that we don't sell anywhere else as well as original art and displays from our projects. If you like what we publish you'll probably like the other stuff we sell. And while we have a lot of constants, we work hard to keep things fresh by finding new products so people are able to stop by regularly and find new things.

Do accept artist submissions for your products?  If so, what's the best way for them to approach you?

We do accept artist submissions. You can email us at submissions at littleotsu.com with images and details.

What is the best thing about owning your own shop?  And the worst?
Being responsible for your own livelihood is pretty awesome and rewarding. On the flip side, it can be daunting and all-consuming. It's a competitive marketplace and it can be tough to keep things unique, but ultimately, by spending time creating our own products, we can't help but keep things interesting. It's great getting to promote good people and things to the public.

What is one lesson you can pass down to future shop-keeps who are just getting started?
Especially in these tough financial times, we can't emphasize enough that you should keep your fixed costs low. Be creative in keeping your expenses down and that will greatly increase your chances of success.

Thank you so much for sharing Yvonne & Jeremy!  You have some awesome insights and an adorable shop to boot!

Be sure to visit Little Otsu next time you're in San Francisco- and to feed the need in the meantime, you can visit their online shop anytime!