What kind of products does the Vermont Country Store sell?”
The most sophisticated business in Vermont just may be that cracker-barrel bastion of old-timey Vermont goodness known as The Vermont Country Store. At a time when most real country stores in Vermont are having a hard time staying open, look past the cheese, the crackers, and the barrel and you’ll find a complex, multimillion dollar, family-owned retailing business. But wasn’t there a real, old-fashioned country store in the Orton family gene pool? Yes, back in 1897, when the Teachout Orton Store in North Calais was run by Gardner Lyman Orton. But The Vermont Country Store is something else again. First and foremost, it’s an ode to nostalgia – nostalgia for things from the start of the last century, on up to the 1970s. Then, it’s a catalog company producing five yearly catalogs – called “Voice of the Mountains” – offering over 5,000 products and operating out of a large call-and-shipping center in Rutland. Then it’s two large stores – the flagship in Weston and a second one in Rockingh
The Orton Family, Proprietors of The Vermont Country Store for Over 60 Years Founders Vrest and Ellen Orton Publish Our First Catalogue in 1945 A Christmas card list turns into a great success In 1945, Vrest and Ellen Orton printed their first catalogue – just 12 pages and 36 products – and mailed it to the folks on their Christmas card list. Vrest, a frugal Yankee at heart, insisted that the merchandise be durable and above all practical. His wife Ellen, who grew up on the Wilcox dairy farm in nearby Manchester, Vermont, made certain the new business was as practical as the products it sold. Decades later, this still holds true as you can see from the hosts of products in our black-and-white Voice of the Mountains Catalogue and full color Catalogue of Goods and Wares. The Vermont Country Store Opens Shop in the Village of Weston in 1946 The roots of our business are in over 100 years of Orton family shopkeepers First Store The Weston, Vermont store opens in 1946 Catalogue orders came
Today, The Vermont Country Store is owned by Lyman Orton and sons Cabot, Gardner, and Eliot, 7th & 8th generation Vermonters, and 3rd & 4th generation storekeepers, who still adhere to the old-fashioned values set forth by Vrest and take pride in being The Purveyors of the Practical and Hard-to-Find.
