The most sophisticated business in Vermont just may be that cracker-barrel bastion of old-timey Vermont goodness known as The Vermont Country Store.At a time when most real country stores in Vermont are having a hard time staying open, look past the cheese, the crackers, and the barrel and you'll find a complex, multimillion dollar, family-owned retailing business.
But wasn't there a real, old-fashioned country store in the Orton family gene pool? Yes, back in 1897, when the Teachout Orton Store in North Calais was run by Gardner Lyman Orton. But The Vermont Country Store is something else again.
First and foremost, it's an ode to nostalgia – nostalgia for things from the start of the last century, on up to the 1970s.
Then, it's a catalog company producing five yearly catalogs – called "Voice of the Mountains" – offering over 5,000 products and operating out of a large call-and-shipping center in Rutland.
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