Sisters hope Medford re-sale boutique soars

On April 5, two sisters opened the doors of their new Medford Outlet Center boutique with the hope that it will fly Off Like a Kite.  
Heidi Johnson and Susan Yarno came up with the name for their re-sale shop after having breakfast at Colossal Café, their favorite St. Paul restaurant. They’d been talking over ideas but hadn’t settled on one. 
As they prepared to leave, Yarno said, “Well, off like a kite!” 
That little turn of phrase stuck even more after they thought about the meaning of the words. 
“At the park, you always look at the kites,” Yarno said. “It resonates fun.”  
The Seattle, Washington natives moved to Forest Lake when Johnson’s husband Peter, a minister, took a job there. Yarno had a career in retail, but Johnson hadn’t yet found her life’s work.  
In July of 2015, they bought Green Door Consignment. A year and a month later, Johnson got a call that redirected her life.  
A friend who served as guardian ad litem for Native American children in Wisconsin first asked the sisters to pray for Jakobe, a baby boy battling a host of medical conditions. Then she asked the Johnsons to adopt him.  
In 2017, they became parents of their first medically fragile child, who soon had a brother, Thunder Luke. Now ages 6 and 5, the boys both have tracheostomy and feeding tubes, and both are deaf.  
“This is my passion, being a special needs mom,” Heidi Johnson said, adding she and Peter plan to adopt other medically fragile kids. 
Green Door closed in 2019. When Peter Johnson accepted a job in southern Minnesota, Yarno decided she wanted to get back to her love for retail, with Heidi Johnson as co-pilot.  
The sisters found the space near RAD Zoo at the Medford Outlet Center appealing for many reasons–chiefly its location right off I-35 and easy access for customers.  
While Green Door was strictly consignment, with customers leaving items up to 90 days, Off Like a Kite purchases and re-sells. The shop carries children’s clothing and toys, which Green Door didn’t have, along with high-end women’s clothing, accessories and shoes, and home décor.  
The mix of goods is rooted in Johnson’s experience as a busy mom. She loved the idea of being able to shop not only for her boys, but also for herself in the same place.  
“The kid part of it sounded like a lot of fun,” she said. “We also knew there were no kid stores in the area where there was also women’s clothing. We really tried to make this an easy place for moms to sell and shop.”  
As they prepared for their April 5 opening, the sisters had no idea how long it would take to stock the shelves. They put out a call for items on a Thursday. By the following Sunday night, Yalon had to email the store and mall social media managers with an announcement that they were full up.  
Johnson said people who have dropped off items seem excited to see the shop open. 
“One woman said to me, ‘This was such a good idea, why did I think of it?’,” she said.  
Off Like a Kite is open at 6750 Frontage Road West, Suite 140, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. There’s no need to make an appointment to bring in items you want to sell.  
The shop will host a visit from the Easter Bunny on Saturday, April 9. Learn more at offlikeakite.com.