When Gina McCalister, a former interior designer, opened Mulberry Jeanโs Accents 21 years ago, she was thinking of the women in her family who ran gift shops of their own.
Her grandmother, Mulberry, ran the gift store in the old Weinbach Pharmacy on Division Street. Later, her mother, Barbara Jean, operated a gift shop at St. Maryโs Hospital and Medical Center (now Ascension St. Vincent Evansville). Carrying on the tradition, McCalister calls her business a โlittle department store.โ
โI wanted a gift shop that everybody could come to feel comfortable. If they want to spend $5 or $500, they could come in here … and everybody could find something,โ says the Benjamin Bosse High School graduate.
Although Mulberry Jeanโs sells some name brands, the focus is on American-made goods and small businesses. McCalister takes yearly trips to Georgiaโs Atlanta Market, a biannual marketplace linking wholesale vendors and purchasers.
โI try to go to the little, small companies that nobody knows about. Thatโs my go-to, all the time,โ she says.
McCalister stocks her store with kitchenware, gardening supplies, clothing and accessories, home decor, and stationery.
Mulberry Jeanโs is known for its fairtrade coffee grounds and loose-leaf tea from around the world. There are 20 unique blends of coffee โ including seasonal offerings like Christmas Cookie and Taste of Spring โ and year-round flavors like Jamaican Me Crazy and Cherry Bomb.
As a tea lover herself, McCalister stocks 70 types such as rooibos, oolong, chamomile, raspberry, lemongrass, valerian root, green, white, and more. She also hosts tea talks throughout the Midwest and South about the health benefits of tea, which can include mitigating allergies and arthritis as well as improving blood sugar, cholesterol, circulation, and more.
โIโm very particular about where my coffee and tea come from,โ McCalister says.
Mulberry Jeanโs hosted tea parties in a small room at the back of the store for 12 years until the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, the area, which McCalister calls the โinspiration room,โ provides up to one week of space for rotating small businesses like West Market, an Evansville graphic T-shirt seller. Itโs an opportunity McCalister wishes she had when she started her own business.
โItโs neat for me because I get to help people trying to build their business,โ she says.
Her favorite part about owning her own business, she says, is โthe people. I love getting to meet all the people.โ
