Give the beauty of B.C. in a box with Old Joy Gift Boxes

Have you ever found yourself looking at the beautiful B.C. mountains or walking through a local market in a small town bursting with charm and wanted to capture the essence of the moment?

Now you can.

Old Joy Gift Boxes (OJGB) is a company in Ladner that sources locally made goods, curates them in a beautiful box with a bouquet and shares them near or far.

This means that if you’ve ever said to a friend or relative in another province, “I wish I could just show you what B.C. is all about,” OJGB can find exactly what that means to you and make it happen – artfully, tastefully and beautifully.

Melissa Mills, owner of OJGB, says she has always been drawn to the idea of creating beautiful things, so she seeks and gathers goods from vintage to modern, and puts them together in a gift box that could essentially be considered a piece of useable art.

All boxes include a vintage item and flowers, and start at $100. For customizations, Mills says she does her best to accommodate requests. Examples of some of the boxes she currently offers are:

The Bambino

The best of B.C. baby finds, including items curate from Fox + Rebel, Little Citizens and From the Seeds.

The Contessa

Relaxing and calming beauty products, including Reassembly Skincare, Happy Spritz Aromatherapy and a Woodlot Candle.

Man Crush

Manly goods from some of B.C.’s finest, including Four Winds Brewing Co, Meat&Bread and Strathcona Socks.

Seven years ago, Mills had an idea after realizing there was a lack of thoughtfully curated gift boxes that reflected B.C. and supported the local economy.

“I saw a gap and I wanted to fill it, I knew I had a great eye,” she says.

As a creative soul, she kept that dream through the many stages of her life until the day came to take action. Now over a year into her business, Mills couldn’t be more happy with the choice to take the leap and wholeheartedly believe in her idea.

“I literally wake up every morning and say ‘wow, I can’t believe I created this for myself,’ and I’m just grinning from ear to ear,” she says. “I have this beautiful little family.”

The family she is referring to is her husband, Adam Mills of Four Winds Brewery, her daughter Daphne and her business – which she considers her other baby.

“Daphne accompanies me to every delivery; I have a wooden gift box in one arm and Daphne is in the other,” she says. “It’s so wonderful for her to be surrounded by the love and appreciation of the actual act of giving. She is always trying to help me put things into the boxes, and when we’re doing flowers, I’ll give her some and she’ll make a mess but now we will smell every bush when we’re walking.”

Mills started the company because she finds great joy in providing something meaningful for others and wants to make sure that no matter what she always keeps those values in mind.

She says the biggest lesson she has learned is to consider the future of the business without moving too quickly, or else the list of to-dos will become so great that you’ll lose sight of the little things.

Those little things are exactly what make OJGB so special. It’s not a mindlessly thrown together box of generic goodies sourced from afar, instead, it’s a true embodiment of life in B.C. and the people who thrive here, put together with love by Mills’ own hands and often, her daughter’s help.

“I have a love for making others happy,” she says. “I believe in everyday kindness and I think there should be more of it.”

At the core of OJGB that’s exactly what it’s about: not only a beautiful gift but the act of giving it.

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Old Joy Gift Boxes

Website: www.oldjoygiftboxes.com

Phone: 604-442-3686