Miniature business is humongous fun

[attach]5731[/attach]While some wives hide receipts to downplay how much money they’ve spent on dollhouses and miniatures, Maria Fowler says they also get supportive spouses at the Little Dollhouse Company.

“One of our customers, before she started doing dollhouses, was into redecorating her house all of the time … and it was very funny because this particular lady had a very supportive husband. Because since she decided to do dollhouses it was far, far less expensive than redecorating her house every six months,” she says. “So he was grateful.”

Although the store has been around since 1975, Fowler took over the company from Will Jameson 12 years ago after she stumbled upon a business for sale sign on Mount Pleasant Road.

“I was doing children’s toys at the time and I walked in and I had never seen a dollhouse before in my life,” she says. “By the end of our small conversation that day I decided that I was going to buy the shop.”

Her husband John, who left his partners in a computer repair business to help out at the store, builds and restores the dollhouses while they source most of the miniatures from Canadian artisans who furnish the homes with everything from loveseats to tiny guitars that can be strummed. She says they occasionally also fill custom orders for rare accessories and plan on doing more exclusive design work in the coming months.

Their customers range in age from two to 92-year-olds, she says, adding many are adults who collect as a hobby. In addition to local shoppers, she says many orders are online and they’ve shipped all over the continent.

“There’s actually less by walk-in than you’d think because people just aren’t aware of this unless they’re in the hobby or unless they’re looking for it specifically,” Fowler says. “We have a lot by reputation.”

Although they’ve moved along Mount Pleasant Road, she says they’ve been at their current store near Manor Road since 2003 and she likes the area’s community feel.

“We have a lot of very, very unique shops here,” she says. “It’s really kind of a small town atmosphere in this area. We don’t have any big box stores and we don’t have any chains, every shop we come across here is unique and interesting.”

Fowler, who hopes her kids will eventually want to take over the business, says the Little Dollhouse Company is the largest store of its kind in the country. However, she says she doesn’t do it for the profits since they don’t sell enough inventory.

“If I wanted to do real business I really wouldn’t be doing this,” she says. “Our return on investment is really crappy. Our turnover is crappy … but it’s certainly a very, very fun business that supports my husband and I and our kids, this is all we do, and our employees so it’s a great kind of lifestyle.”

She says they try hard to recreate the world in miniature and says the best part of the job is working for herself and getting to be a kid all the time.

“People just get astounded especially when they come in and they were just out because they decided to take a walkabout on Mount Pleasant,” she says. “We’re a pretty magical place and every time people find us they say, ‘Oh my God, I don’t believe there’s a place like this.’ ”