Toss Designs Opens in Los Gatos!

Toss Designs, the hugely popular handbag shop that has locations in the South Bay, has opened up at the empty retail location at 130 No. Santa Cruz Ave., in downtown Los Gatos.

Opened Oct. 5, the store is owned by Jennifer Hogan, a San Anselmo designer who creates all the brightly colored handbags for sale and their matching accessories, said the store manager, who identified herself as J.M.

Other small giftable items are also found in the store from other vendors. The Los Gatos shop is the seventh location for Toss Designs, which first opened in San Anselmo and now has one at the Town and Country Village in Palo Alto.

The store, so far, has three employees and more will be hired. "We have travel bags, day bags, purses, and even a reusable poly bag made of a plastic fiber that's easy to clean and priced reasonably," she said.

The shop also offers monogramming to its customers such as peel-and-stick, iron-on and and stitched-on methods. "We always keep an iron behind the register so if you're running behind and you need a last-minute gift, we definitely have something to fill the need," J.M. said.

In about 1,000 square feet of retail space, Toss Designs has managed to create a welcoming environment for its clients, with attractive wood floors, nicely decorated window displays, white-colored walls, and several tables that contain the attractive merchandise in so-called "color stories" where everything is grouped in colors.

The window merchandise right now is orange and navy, but was going to be changed to green and navy today, J.M. explained. "We completely re-merchandise the store every two weeks ... we'll have pink and black in the windows. We're constantly keeping it fresh and new. We get new products every day."

The store has one fitting room and one small stock room. "It's been great. We're really lucky. Toss has quite a following. Our customers are very familiar with the brand and are excited to have us in Los Gatos," she added.

"I love it. I love these bags," exclaimed Los Gatos shopper Lisa Zirl, while perusing the displays inside the store. "I don't want to leave, but I don't even know what I want."

Toss Designs Los Gatos hasn't had an official ribbon-cutting ceremony yet, but will in the future as more recognition is gained about their new operation.

J.M. said the business' philosophy is to do as much as possible to give back to the community and offers clients in-store shopping events that give a portion of the sales to their charities. "We can book these events any day of the week, during store hours or after store hours," she said. "We work with schools, nonprofits and it's something to help us get established in the community," she said.

The business is opened 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sunday. During the holidays, the hours will be extended, J.M. said.

Toss Designs was started in 2004 as a wholesale company.

Details: 408-395-9700, or shoptoss@tossdesigns.com.