Meet Tory Orlando of Jaunt

Today we’d like to introduce you to Tory Orlando.

Tory, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I was born and raised in Arlington Heights, but I left pretty young to go to Arizona for undergrad, and then Washington, DC for grad school where I did a master’s in public policy.

My professional background was actually in IT and public policy — largely working in the intersection of technology and policy for a lot of the big federal agencies, nonprofits, NGOs (World Bank, USAID, etc. etc.).

My husband and I got married and had all four of our kiddos out there. We spent over ten years there and we honestly thought we’d be there forever. While living out East and traveling around that area, we’d always find ourselves in awesome boutique shops (e.g., in Savannah, Charleston, etc.), just searching for unique goodies.

Switch back to Chicago… My mom has a lot of health issues — and long story short, we made a super quick decision three years ago to come back to Chicago, buy my childhood home, and be closer to her and my father to help them as they age. When we got to the “burbs,”

I found myself constantly going downtown — searching for cool shops like the ones we would discover out east. It became increasingly apparent that there aren’t a ton of options in the suburbs for unique home decor and handmade items — both large pieces and small, so I created Jaunt.

The Jaunt brand centers on discovering and curating the best independent makers. We focus on CUSTOM furniture builds | HANDMADE products from each of the 50 states | and VINTAGE finds. We are, and forever will be, a brick and mortar shopping experience filled with hidden gems and awesomeness.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
HA!! No. It never is when you’re trying to do something large that you’re really passionate about. I literally joke that my “learning curve was straight vertical.”

Things like finding the space, opening shop — that actually went pretty smoothly and felt fated — like it FELT right. But my goal is not to just be some tiny shop in the burbs.

I really want this brand to grow and to be a very, very solid, honest company that our customers can rely upon for unique goods. And that takes a ton of time, and it means a TON of lessons learned.

We do a lot of custom furniture builds, and even things down to the nitty-gritty furniture design, going to site visits, coordinating schedules, QA / QC — We also import certain goods from Bali and Indo — These are all kind of their own mini operations — all with their own challenges, etc. There are just a lot of moving parts at any given time.

I find my biggest challenge is wanting to scale and having to do it slowly, b/c if you do it too quickly you’ll run yourself dry and go out of business.

I also do have four children — all between 7 and 3… and finding a balance between my “homeworld” and my work world is absolutely an ongoing challenge.

I created a “Kids Zone,” which is wildly popular for parents to allow their kiddos to come into the shop and draw on our massive mountain chalkboard while they shop — things like that have allowed me to incorporate my own children into “shop life” a bit more smoothly.

Please tell us about Jaunt.
I stated this earlier…. but:

The Jaunt brand centers on discovering and curating the best independent makers. We focus on CUSTOM furniture builds | HANDMADE products from each of the 50 states | and VINTAGE finds. We are, and forever will be, a brick and mortar shopping experience filled with hidden gems and awesomeness.

CUSTOM: We do a TON of custom furniture builds — everything from urban industrial, to a farmhouse, to mid-century modern… We’re on (I think) our 38th project since starting that line of the business in June. It’s by far where we can get the most creative.

HANDMADE: My goal is to have an artist or craftsman from each of the 50 states in our shop. So far I have 18 states represented, across 47 suppliers. So it’s a little bit like a brick-and-mortar Etsy… Everything is handmade, nothing mass produced.

VINTAGE: We have a number of partners that allow us to bring in a lot of funky vintages finds, from old typewriters and cameras to vintage iron bases for custom projects, I like to pepper this throughout the shop.

You won’t find the stuff we have in-shop in any big-box store, and I plan to keep it that way!!! 🙂 <3

Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
My favorite memory is going to Boca Grande, FL with my mom, dad, and two older brothers — It’s this sleepy little town on a tiny island in the Gulf of Mexico.

I spent every summer from about May to late August there, throughout my entire childhood. It’s my happy place, and where some of my happiest childhood memories were created. Don’t go there, — keep it sleepy!! LOL (kidding).

Contact Info:

• Address: Jaunt 131 W. Wing Arlington Heights, IL 60005
• Website: www.jauntchicago.com
• Email: tory@jauntchicago.com
• Instagram: IG: https://www.instagram.com/jauntchicago/
• Facebook: FB: https://www.facebook.com/jauntchicago/
• Yelp: Jaunt

Getting in touch: VoyageChicago is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.