Business

Holiday Shopping 2023: Against the Grain

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In this installment of our holiday shopping series, we talk to Chris Meier, owner of Against the Grain on Main Street. 

Here’s our exchange. ***

New Canaanite: For our readers who may not know your store, please give us some background about Against the Grain and an overview of what you have here, how it all ties together. 

Chris Meier: Been here eight years. What we do is we rotate. We do a lot of outdoor furniture in the spring and summer. We work with Amish craftsmen, we sell teak line concrete tables, but the poly lumber Adirondack chairs—the recycled plastic—that’s probably our best seller in the summer.

Against The Grain

Local Business Q&A: Against The Grain

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Today’s Q&A with a local business owner is with Chris Meier of Against The Grain at 91 Main St. Here’s our exchange. New Canaanite: Against The Grain opened five years ago in downtown New Canaan. Congratulations on hitting that milestone this year. How’s it going at your Main Street shop? Chris Meier: Thanks Mike!

Business

Local Businesses and COVID-19: Against The Grain

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For today’s Q&A with a local business, we interviewed Against The Grain owner Chris Meier. The Main Street business (here on Instagram), selling handcrafted gifts and furniture, is open 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily and offers FaceTime interactions as well as shipping and delivery, and curbside pickup. Here’s our interview. How are you doing? Chris Meier: Like all businesses, it has definitely been an adjustment period.

Business

New Canaan Olive Oil Moving To Shared Space on Main Street Jan. 1, with ‘Against The Grain’ Furniture Shop

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New Canaan Olive Oil, a popular shop on Elm Street’s “50-yard line” for more than four years, will move into a shared commercial space on Main Street next month. Heidi Burrows, the business’s owner, said her lease is up Dec. 31 and that she’s moving the retail shop into Against The Grain at 91 Main St. There will be no disruption for customers, Burrows said. “We expect almost everything to stay the same, just in a different location,” she said.

Business

‘Against the Grain’: New Shop Featuring Handcrafted Wood Furniture, Amish- and Artisan-Made Goods To Open on Main Street

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Two years after Varnum’s Pharmacy vacated its longtime, iconic home alongside the alley on Main Street, a new business is poised to take over the commercial space on a full-time basis. Chris Meier said he’s planning to launch ‘Against The Grain’ at 91 Main St. in mid-August. Various Adirondack-style chairs already are appearing outside the store, which provides handcrafted wood and other items from local artists and is a unique source of high-quality Amish-made furniture, Meier said. A native of Cape Cod, Meier said he selected New Canaan after spending about six months doing business in a pop-up space in Stamford’s South End, where he lives with his wife Beth, a 2000 graduate of Stamford High School (they’ve been married for one year).