Whigby: A Tipping Point

As we put our Fall/Winter catalog to bed on this rainy August afternoon (cover above), we wanted to take a brief moment to brag (shamelessly) about how far we’ve come in our short history. As of August 2010, Whigby can now be found in over 500 retail outlets. Chains that carry Whigby include West Elm (Williams-Sonoma), Urban Outfitters (UK), Kate’s Paperie, Paper Source, Paperchase, and Selfridges (UK). Museum stores include MoCA, the American Folk Art Museum, The Neuberger Museum of Art and the Museum of Arts & Design. In addition to many of the best independent stationery stores (like Flax and Lundeens), Whigby can be found in some of the coolest bookshops; places like The Powerhouse Arena and Posman Books come to mind. Whigby is also available in high-end kitchen stores, chic flower shops and even a few bakeries (like Big Sugar Bakeshop in Studio City). Perhaps most gratifying is the fact that Whigby’s clients tend to reorder again and again – we just finished packing our 5th for Kate’s (so we know Whigby is selling well).This year, we proudly added two of the best representatives in the business to the Whigby salesforce: Lynn Michell Group in Los Angeles (covering Southern California) and Sharon Smiley & Co. (Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts and New Hampshire). But what of Whigby’s two founders? In 2009, Todd added little Hugo to his family of four and he’s now adding a third storey to his downtown Toronto home (yes, those two facts are related). And Frank just put his second cover for The New Yorker to bed. He also recently finished his first children’s picture book for Little, Brown in New York (spring 2011). And yet, Todd still rides his motorcycle way too fast and Frank still eats too many fried foods. At Whigby, some things never change. Thank you for listening – we do hope you'll continue to watch us grow.