Rose & Judy / Ten Thousand Villages
915 King Street
Alexandria, VA 22314
703-684-1435
www.villagesofalexandria.com
About Rose and Judy:
Ten Thousand Villages of Alexandria is run by two women, Rose and Judy, who are passionate about what they do. Rose first started as a sales associate after having been a faithful customer for years. Judy actually started out as a volunteer for the store four years ago after she and her husband returned to the States from being abroad. When she returned she told a friend, who works for a Ten Thousand Villages in Raleigh, NC, that she was looking for her next step and he convinced her to volunteer herself here in Alexandria. Both Rose and Judy expressed that “we would not be in retail if were not fair trade retail.” Rose and Judy are now co-managers.
About Ten Thousand Villages:
Ten Thousand Villages is a non profit retail store that only sells fairly traded products. The products that you will find here are hand crafted by over 100 artisans in over 30 developed and underdeveloped countries. It is Ten Thousand Villages aim to find artisans that need to sell their crafts in order to better their quality of life. Here you will find fairly traded jewelry, home décor, gifts and more.
Business Philosophy:
Ten Thousand Villages focuses on customer support. They will go through the extra effort to find out the background on any of their products. “When a customer is making a purchase we will look up the artisan and tell them about who made the product which country and city they are from.”
Why did you choose to do this:
“We chose to work for Ten Thousand Villages because here we get the feeling of helping others. Also, after living abroad I saw the value to bridge internationally,” says Judy.
Why Alexandria:
Ten Thousand Villages came to Alexandria 13 years ago as a branch out test store. They wanted to see how the Washington area would support this idea of fairly traded items and it responded very well. “I believe Ten Thousand Villages worked here because this area has a great global perspective.”
Funny Story:
One of our volunteers, who has also been on the board for a long time, has always shopped for her family gifts here. After receiving gift after gift from Ten Thousand Villages her daughter says to her, “Mom, you don’t have to support all ten thousand villages!”
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