Sourpuss Featured Retailer: Beadesaurus!

This month we're taking you across the pond for our January Featured Retailer- Beadesaurus! Rick and Ruth had us cracking up with their interview responses! Be sure to read on and learn more about these great folks & their Birmingham based store in the Oasis Fashion Mall. If you're in  West Midlands you should definitely be sure to visit them! (They have excellent taste in candy!) Beadesaurus_Interview_1 Tell us a little about yourselves and the history of the store. Rick: I opened the store back in June 2000, on my birthday :] I’d been studying at the Jewellery School in Birmingham, and had always wanted to own my own store to sell my jewellery through. What started out as a Bead shop with some of my own jewellery has grown to include tons of awesome clothing and accessories. Ruth: I stuck my nose in around 8 years ago and launched our online store, I hide myself away in the warehouse every day now doing everything interwebby. Where did the Beadesaurus name come from? Rick: I love beads, and really love dinosaurs. When I was a kid my favourite toy shop was Toys R Us. To me that looked and sounded like toysaurus, I called it that every time I visited the shop for another crappy toy :] It just all clicked when the shop opened, beads, dinosaurs – Beadesaurus :] Tell us about the Oasis Fashion Mall! What's it like working around so many other independent retailers? Rick: It’s cool to be amongst so many independent stores and like minded store owners; it was a big reason why I chose to open the store there. The Oasis has been a big part of Birmingham for over 40 years. They opened the store with a parade down the main shopping street back in the 70’s, complete with live camels, god knows why! Would have been awesome to have seen that through the streets of Birmingham. Beadesaurus_Interview_2 What gets your customers get excited when they come in to the store?  Rick: New products and the store itself.  Its like a maze through all the different shops in Oasis. I love to see people discover us on the first time they visit. They love the name, we stand right out within the Oasis store. Its good to see happy faces :] Have any celebrities ever come into the shop? Rick: Yeah Roy Wood (Wizzard) was a regular through the shop for years. Ruth: One of the biggest music venues in Birmingham was behind the Oasis until a couple of years ago when it moved across town, and we shared a loading area with their stage door. Tons and tons of bands have passed through the shop over the years, from Slipknot to Blink 182 and New Found Glory and loads more that I would never recognize in a million years. Pete Docherty (The Libertines & Babyshambles) mistaken stumbled through the wrong load in door once and had to be ushered back to the gig venue in his drunken stupor. The Oasis itself over it’s 40 years has seen it’s fair share of celebs pass through the doors, and even work there; in the early 80s Boy George worked in one of the stores. 
You're going on a trip. What 3 things absolutely must be in your carry on? Rick: Aspirin, laptop, chocolate based snack :] Ruth: Kindle, make-up, toothbrush


. Who's the cooler superhero? Superman or Batman? Rick: Batman all day long – he’s got mad skills! Ruth: Batman, his outfit is a million times more badass. Who would play you in the movie version of your life? Rick: Philip Seymour Hoffman, but not in his Boogie Nights phase. Ruth: Someone who makes consistently terrible movies a lot; Kristen Stewart would be perfect. What are you excited about in 2014? Rick: Travelling more! We get to work at some great events throughout the country each year. Meeting people who know the name of our store from a city 300 miles away is a real buzz! Ruth: I have a minion, sorry staff member, to help me with the website now so I’m looking forward to not working 16 hour days all the time! Whoo hoo! 


Any upcoming Beadesaurus news you'd like to share with us? We’re 14 years young next year! A moody little teenager! Gonna be planning a party for the summer time for sure :]
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