VINTAGE: Characterized by excellence, maturity, and enduring appeal; Classic. Old or outmoded. Of the best. Of the most distinctive.
It’s stylish, “buttery” soft, thin and from the 70s and 80s…it’s VINTAGE CLOTHING! John Foster-Keddie, the owner of the vintage clothing Web site, www.vintagevantage.com, will tell you exactly what college hipsters are adding to their wardrobes. Foster-Keddie graduated from Yale in 2000 with a degree in American Studies. After graduating from college, he landed a job in the corporate world at a respectable consulting firm, only to find himself bored and uninterested.
A self-proclaimed, “thrift store-scoring vintage junky,” he decided to make a living out of something he did for fun anyway. ” I pounced at it like some kind of mountain cat,” he said. Inspired by vintage styling, Foster-keddie thinks of the clothing line as smart, fun, and irreverent T-shirts for the college market.
He said, “I think a big part of the recent surge in popularity [of vintage] is due to the general backlash to the homogeny of the big corporate brands like Abercrombie, Old Navy, etc. Who wants a stodgy old guy in a boardroom telling them what’s cool? Also, a t-shirt from the 80’s takes college kids back to a simpler time, before homework, and that makes them feel all warm inside.” Foster-keddie has been running www.vintagevantage.com for two years now. However, he started off slowly. His mom and sister thought he was crazy and wondered when he was going to get a haircut and a real job.
He says his focus is customer service and making vintage vantage a real experience for his customers, as opposed to being just another guy selling vintage on eBay.
He says there is no secret to success, “You just have to go out there and do it!” he said. “You can always go back to working 9 to 5. So try something crazy, at the very least it will be a good learning experience.”
Thanks to Foster-Keddie, vintage clothing no longer has to be fought over at local thrift stores. You can simply visit the Web site and purchase classic vintage clothing, or bid on a groovy T-shirt through eBay.
Foster-Keddie’s rapidly growing business also serves as an inspiration to college students. Foster-Keddie initially landed in the corporate world only finding himself bored and unhappy. So he took a chance and turned one of his hobbies into a rewarding career. Because Foster-Keddie’s openness to experiences he will never have to “work” another day in his life.
There’s just something enduring about the vintage look and just ask Foster-keddie, “It’s so dang comfy.” Vintage is here to last. What’s new today will one day be vintage envied by college students.
