Boomerang
At most thrift shops, the clothes that come in are simply hung where they fit, and flipping through the racks feels like a scavenger hunt. Not so at Boomerang (900 Pennsylvania Ave., Kansas City, Mo. 816-531-6111, boomerang-kc.com), where every item is carefully sorted by decade. Here, shopping feels like getting in a time machine and setting the controls to take you wherever you want to go, from post-war Suburbia to the days of disco.
This 3,200-square-foot vintage clothing store in Midtown opened in 1989, mainly selling mid-century modern furniture. The shop started selling more clothing after 9/11 and the ensuing market crash.
“People were a bit more tight with their money,” owner Kevin Kinkead says. “They didn’t have $300 to buy a couch, but they had $30 to spend at a party, so people were buying more vintage clothing for period parties. Period parties aren’t limited to one age group, so we can have high schoolers coming in looking for clothing for a high school dance, or we have 50-year-olds looking for attire for themed banquet parties.”
Boomerang has everything from bell-bottoms to fur coats, with an entire shelf dedicated to cowboy boots. This shop only sells items from the 1940s to the 1980s, and most items come from referrals.
“Usually someone will hear about us and call us to get rid of some of their mother’s or grandmother’s clothing they found in a closet,” Kinkead says.
“Other times, we’re hunting out specific pieces. No stone goes unturned.”