Business & Tech

Iguana Vintage Is a Family-Operated 'Blast From the Past'

The three-story Hollywood vintage clothing shop takes pride in its customer service and its vast merchandise.

The wealth of colorful wigs, extravagant hats and elaborate accessories that are on display at Iguana Vintage Clothing seem to be doing a number on the average shopper.

“People think we’re just a costume store,” said Darren Cohn, as he surveyed his family’s 15,000-square-foot playground. “We’re so much more than that.”

With racks upon racks of clothing, Iguana Vintage Clothing on Hollywood Boulevard may be among the largest of vintage clothing stores in the nation. However, its biggest draw may not be its massive selection of women’s dresses, its nearly 1,000 sports jerseys or its impressive bank of jeans and flannel shirts.

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It seems its biggest draw is the customer’s curiosity.

“People look at us and see that we have vintage clothing and want to see what it’s all about,” said Darren Cohn.

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Darren, along with brothers Eric and Evan, are the day-to-day operators of Iguana Vintage Clothing, a store that was founded by their father in 1993 in Sherman Oaks. Since then, Iguana has expanded, finding its second home on Hollywood Boulevard in 2004.

Structured Chaos

In an arena where shopping can be chaotic, order martters. The gargantuan vintage clothing store with an amount of merchandise comparable to a three-story H&M. And with order, comes definition.

“Some people get confused with the terms ‘vintage’ and ‘retro’,” said Darren. “Vintage means clothes that are actually from the past. Retro means new clothes, made to look old.”

Several popular clothing businesses, such as an Abercrombie & Fitch, promote lines that include “vintage clothing,” when in all actuality, the clothes are retro.

Iguana’s merchandise, according to Darren, is less than five percent retro.

“It’s unique,” Darren said of vintage clothing as opposed to retro clothing. “It is something that you will not find anywhere else. You never know what you’re going to get.”

“It’s a blast from the past for senior citizens, even middle-aged people maybe looking for old school Adidas,” Darren added.

Iguana Vintage Clothing spans three floors of merchandise. The entry-level floor includes  men’s and women’s apparel to purses to costumes. The top floor is the shoe section, and the basement floor incorporates more apparel, as well as vintage bed sheets, from Mickey Mouse to Transformers.

And to top it off, it’s all color-coordinated, with the hopes of making the vintage shopper’s trek a bit easier.

“Teenagers dig the trends, and they come in and figure they can find stuff in here they’ll never find in a mall,” Darren said. “The bottom line is, everybody has their own taste.”

Iguana Beginnings

Iguana Vintage Clothing first hit the scene 19 years ago in Sherman Oaks, a location that still stands today.

“At the time, it was something that was unique and original, something that was fun,” said Eric Cohn. “The idea of being able to recycle clothing and bringing back old styles. With a store like this, you can create your own style. This can bring out the creative side of you, bring out your individuality.”

In 2004, the Cohn family ballooned its small business empire by opening its second Iguana location at 6320 Hollywood Blvd., in the heart of one of America’s most eclectic cities.

“We feel very fortunate to be in this location,” Eric said. “We appreciate the wide variety of people that come along the Boulevard. The fact that we have a location this size, we’re lucky enough to provide for different kinds of people, different ages and different mentalities.”

One might think that as far as a customer's taste, there is a distinct divide between Sherman Oaks residents and Hollywood residents. However, the Cohns have seen firsthand that there is a Hollywood-aspect to the normally reserved Sherman Oaks community.

“Over the 19 years, demographics have definitely changed,” Eric said of Sherman Oaks, which he labeled as “more trendy” than Hollywood.

“It’s become a younger area in Sherman Oaks, and it’s becoming more and more like a Hollywood area.”

The Business Side

Most shoppers’ experience with a “vintage clothing store” reaches as far as Buffalo Exchange, which essentially is a consignment shop that incorporates some vintage clothing, not a vintage clothing store.  

In fact, there is a misconception that all vintage shops accept donations, buy customer clothing, or operate as consignment stores, meaning they sell a customer’s clothing, then give that customer a portion of the proceeds.

Iguana, however, incorporates no merchandise from customers.

“When it comes to vintage clothing, it’s very unique and original,” Eric said. “So to purchase from the public would be very difficult, to wait for that specific item we want.”

Establishments that do incorporate customer merchandise, such as Buffalo Exchange, create an atmosphere in which the customer may find their clothing being turned down. At places such as Goodwill, the customers create the tone of the merchandise, considering Goodwill operates off of donations.

In the case of Iguana, the Cohns employ a buyer system, in which they locate the vintage clothing and purchase it to sell in the store.

“We literally just go around all over and try to find unique pieces for the store,” Eric said.

Hollywood Status

A number of television programs, such as That 70’s Show and Jimmy Kimmel Live have taken their time to pick through Iguana’s tremendous inventory, but the newfound popularity of the Cohns’ vintage shop has done little to change the family goal of maintaining a modest profile and providing genuine customer service.

“That’s not how we, as a family, want to run Iguana Vintage Clothing,” Darren said. “We want to run it as a store that you’re comfortable in that stands on its own, not on the fly-by-night celebrity.”

Iguana incorporates a number of customer-friendly methods in order to maintain its ingenuity, such as a 15-percent lifetime discount for every Facebook fan.

Prices at Iguana Vintage Clothing are less than half of that at department stores of chain establishments.

In addition, Iguana employs an online shopping service, in which customers submit a request, such as dark blue jean shorts in a size 34. Iguana will then locate the item in the correct size and email the customer pictures of available items that match their request.

“Just because we’re on Hollywood Boulevard, we don’t have the personality of, ‘We’re Hollywood,’” Darren said. “We have the personality of down-to-earth people that want to provide a good business for people.”

Luckily for the Cohns, in their line of business, things never go out of style.

“We have stuff that may be popular 10 years ago, but not so popular now,” Eric said. “We always have this feeling that it may just recycle itself.”

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