Sock Dreams

By Mikkah Sorrells

Winter lurks just around the corner, and that means that somehow or another, people are looking for ways to keep their feet warm. Most people go for standard socks – maybe a thick cottony pair or maybe two or three layers of thinner ones. Regardless of how one keeps his or her feet warm, there is at least one sure fire way to go green while doing it.

The owners call it Sock Dreams, and it’s the ultimate sock store. The store slogan says it all when a shopper visits the website: “The best sock store in the known universe!” Sock Dreams carries every kind of sock to fit any kind of foot, leg or fashion sense, with most of them ranging in the seven to 20 dollar range. The store remains open for online orders 24 hours a day and they restock often. They don’t sell just socks either – they retail everything from half-socks and thigh highs to arm warmers and petticoats.

Sock Dreams operates out of Portland, OR, where its one walk-in store is located.  Four women operate the store. One of them is Brigid Wells, the Director of Marketing for Sock Dreams. First put into operation in 2000, a young woman with a fashion sense all her own decided she wanted to open her own sock store. She started with making her own socks and decided to expand into selling them to others.

“It was her own kind of statement,” Wells said. “She decided that it was enough that she could offer it to other people.”

Sock Dreams stock consists of all kinds of socks, some created by the operators, some not. They buy other brands, like B.ella, E.G. Smith and MP out of Denmark, wholesale from other companies, said Wells, although she estimated that most of their sales come from their own designs. They also sell brands sold by local designers, like Two Brothers Organic. The end result: many different styles and types of socks from which people can choose their favorite.

And best of all, all the socks sold in the store are made from eco-friendly material. It has always been this way, said Wells; they just didn’t know it at first.

“We have our line of socks that’s made from recycled cotton,” Wells said. “And when we realized that it was something we could do and were really interested in doing, we brought it up with the people who manufacture our socks.”

The socks made at Sock Dreams are produced at a small mill that is family owned, Wells said, which is really rare in this day and age. When they went to talk about using recycled materials for the socks, they were pleasantly surprised when they heard their socks were already eco-friendly.

Since then, said Wells, more people have been asking about eco-friendly socks. With more on the market, she said, people are now more aware of what is available to them.

“We probably hear more [about it] now in the past few years than in the very beginning,” Wells said.

Likewise, she said, the customers make a big impact on what ends up in the store and what doesn’t – Sock Dreams does not take customer input lightly. And since Sock Dreams remains a small operation, it becomes easy to mingle with and talk to customers when they come in to shop.

“[It is] Kind of a benefit of being a small operation,” Wells said.

Sock Dreams isn’t a chain yet, with its one walk-in store located in Portland, OR. But, said Wells, a chain certainly isn’t out of the question. It is a matter of building up, and slowly, she said.  She also remains sometimes surprised by the growth and development of Sock Dreams.

“We have a very broad vision of the future,” Wells said. “A very optimistic view.”