Our Story

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A message from our founder, Janice Parsons:

“It is my sincere pleasure to welcome you to beadshop.com! Whether this is your first or your hundredth time visiting us, our goal is to delight you with projects and products to make your jewelry shine and spark your creativity! I began my love of beads and all things beading when I was 12 years old in my mother's antique jewelry and bead store in Palo Alto, California. That was 1960! 

I came back in 1982 as a new mother and partnered with my mother, Lydia Teichner, to create The Bead Shop from her store of antiques, china and glass.  From day one, my mission has been to sell products I would use myself, and make sure that each and every product we sell measures up to the highest standards. I have had the pleasure of witnessing new beaders find their creative voices as well as mentoring employees and customers in successful careers in the jewelry industry. I feel honored to work side-by-side with Kate Richbourg now, my business partner to bring you the best in jewelrymaking, etc. Welcome to our Beadshop Family…and happy beading!”

 ~janice

The Beadshop.com Story

My mother, Lydia, started out in the late 1950's in Palo Alto, California, selling antiques, beads, and vintage jewelry. This was just when the new engineers after WWII were moving to Palo Alto to create Silicon Valley. Stanford University had been the hub of technology and everyone gravitated to Palo Alto. My dad, Bob Teichner, was one of those engineers. He was employee #62 at Hewlett Packard. Those were the days! After school, I would bike over to my mom's store and work with her selling beads, making jewelry and waiting on customers. I loved it all. Lydia taught me everything she knew about business, as well as sharing her love of antiques, art, and (most of all) people.

 

Lydia  

After running the antique shop for many years, in 1982 Lydia asked me to become a partner in her business…she was ready to retire. I jumped at the chance to be my own boss. I quit my job in Silicon Valley and became Lydia's partner. It was then that the antique shop became The Bead Shop.  

Painted plate of the original location of The Bead Shop in Palo Alto

The Bead Shop expanded to multiple locations throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. And it was home to many firsts over the years, such as producing 99Beads, one of the very first mail-order bead catalogs. Lydia retired, but still visited the store almost every day until she passed away in 1991. Hundreds of friends and strangers came to her memorial service and told wonderful stories of how they loved Lydia and all she had taught them about life. It was amazing.

In addition to opening more locations in San Jose and Los Altos, 1996 brought about a new frontier: www.beadshop.com was born! The team transitioned from mail-order catalog to web sales, bringing about another first for the company (and we think for the beading industry).... online bead sales.

A feature on Janice, from the Palo Alto Register, July 1992

Classes and learning have always been a large part of our mission. In 1992, Kate Richbourg joined the company as General Manager and Class Director, and it wasn’t long before The Bead Shop became the place to take classes in beading, wire work, metalsmithing, and mixed media. Without a doubt, beadshop was pushing the limits of creativity with extraordinary instructors and dynamic, classes constantly changing. It was a convergence of talents and, because of this community of teachers and students, beadshop's reputation grew.

Class Schedule from The Bead Shop circa 2002 

In 2002, Kate left The Bead Shop with blessings and continued to make her mark in the bead world. She opened her very successful store in San Francisco, Beadissimo, and besides writing two books, she was in high-demand as an instructor. Through all this, we remained in touch and I watched Kate's career take off with joy. 

In the mid 2000’s, I began to scale back the business and focus on the flagship store in Palo Alto. In August of 2008, I decided to close the Palo Alto store that had been a landmark in the community since 1982. "It wasn't an easy decision but retail was changing and we were in the middle of a recession." Downsizing from 25 in staff to just two, I focused on the website and learning how to make and post videos on YouTube. (Yes, this was that long ago!) Working out of the spare room in my father's house and then my small apartment, little by little the online shop grew and we stayed in business. And in 2011, the website team moved to an office location in Redwood City. We were doing so well. This was really amazing!

In 2016, Kate came “back home” to beadshop.com and added the much loved twice-weekly Beadshop LIVE broadcasts (another industry first) as well as a variety of new projects to the lineup. "Kate returning to beadshop was a game changer. Just as I needed to slow down, Kate was ready to take us into the future and the fast lane." 

In 2019, Janice moved to Virginia from California to be near her family and work remotely. Kate took over the reigns of running the company. Earlier in the year, January 2024, beadshop became bead happy LLC. It was long overdue for Kate to become managing partner and equal owner of the business, so we legally became a partnership.

Kate and I understand that these are extraordinary times for all of us. Your support of our small business means the world, and we truly couldn’t do this without you. Thank you for being a part of our journey!