“One to two to three to two to one, and now two. And I’m never going back to three.” That’s Suzannah Fischer, eyes closed, recounting the number of O’Suzannah shops she’s owned at one time since she first opened her eclectic boutique in 1996 on the Downtown Mall.
Before going out on her own, Fischer worked retail for years, everywhere from Barr-ee Station on the Corner to Bath & Body Works at the Fashion Square Mall. And when the opportunity to buy an existing business in the current Corner Juice spot presented itself 25 years ago, she pounced. But before the place officially became hers, Fischer and her mother “went to Virginia National Bank in Barracks Road during a freak snow storm, so my mom could cosign a loan for $30,000 so I could buy it.”
Success came quickly, something Fischer credits to her persistence, a strong work ethic, and a knack for curating. “I love the whole process of finding goodies, putting them together, and selling them to cool people,” she says, adding that it’s important to balance high-end items—a handcrafted backpack made by Pennsylvania artisans or a sterling silver poppy-seed pod necklace—with things that children can afford to buy their moms for Mother’s Day.
And when it comes to displaying it all, Fischer says “colorizing” is the key to making it work. “A theme—the cookbooks and candles all in one place—would look nauseating to me,” she says. “You can really make something out of so many different colors and shapes and price points in one place. It actually can take on a theme too, if it’s about a certain color.”
A quick spin around her Second Street space (her other store, devoted to all things babies and children, is on the Downtown Mall), confirms this. Various shades of beautifully displayed red merchandise are on white shelves near the cash register. Books look just right next to bags, which are near tea towels and scarves that share space with wrapping paper, puzzles, water bottles, socks, soaps, journals, and cards. A few feet away is a section full of black, white, and gray bowls, candles, pencils, stationery, umbrellas, lotion, mugs, vases, and more books.
“Books are what I like the most,” says Fischer, who places “these crazy-large book orders” the moment she gets home from the various markets where she finds much of her stock. “It’s my very favorite thing when they come in. Books make every section of the store make sense; they bring a cohesiveness and make the whole thing look so tempting.”
Over the past year, however, she’s been all about puzzles. “I bought puzzles up the watoots” during the pandemic, she says. “And cookbooks and chocolate bars.” The shift to online sales was difficult (“I didn’t know what I was doing when I wasn’t greeting people at the door and helping them find cool stuff”), but she’s still here, and business is steady—on a recent rainy Wednesday afternoon there was a stream of customers who were looking for everything from hostess and birthday gifts (yes, she’ll wrap them for you) to items with the word “Charlottesville” on them.
“I wouldn’t trade doing business in Charlottesville for anything,” Fischer says. “I was born here, my mother was born here, her mother was born here. I know Charlottesville, and I can’t imagine being anywhere else.”