“Building a Legacy, One Treasure at a Time”
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✨ Building a Legacy, One Treasure at a Time
Kate's Treasures15 is more than an online shop. It is the business Dad and I talked about creating together, built around the things he loved and the collection he spent a lifetime putting together.
Long before there was a website, a Shopify store or a parcel waiting to be posted, there was Dad.
And really, that is where this story has to begin.
Dad, the Stories and the Collection
Dad was an actor and scriptwriter with a lifelong love of cinema, books and storytelling.
He loved discovering films that other people had never heard of, finding unusual editions, exploring cinema from around the world and surrounding himself with books connected to the stories, people and subjects that interested him.
Over the years, that became an extraordinary personal collection of more than 8,000 DVDs, Blu-rays, books, CDs and other treasures.
There is world cinema. British television. Foreign-language films. Classic cinema. Documentaries. Music. Books connected to acting and writing. Familiar titles sitting beside obscure ones that might only mean something to the person who has spent years trying to find them.
To somebody else, they could have looked like shelves full of things.
To me, they were part of Dad.
Every shelf reflected something Dad had watched, read, researched, worked with or simply found fascinating. That is why Dad's Collection has never felt like ordinary stock to me, and it never will.
The Business We Never Got to Build Together
Dad and I talked for years about doing something with the collection.
The idea was simple: give the films, books and other treasures somewhere they could be properly appreciated and help them find people who would understand why they were worth keeping.
We never got the chance to build that business together.
After losing Dad, I could have packed everything away. I could have treated the collection as a job that simply needed clearing.
But that never felt right.
I wanted his films to be watched again. I wanted his books to be read. I wanted the obscure titles he had spent years finding to reach somebody who might have spent years looking for exactly the same thing.
So I started doing what Dad and I had talked about.
Why Kate's Treasures15?
The name was never chosen at random.
The 15 in Kate's Treasures15 comes from Dad's birthday, 15 January. It means that wherever this business goes and however much it grows, Dad remains permanently part of its name.
Kate's Treasures15 became the dream we had talked about, only in a way neither of us had imagined.
What began through grief slowly became something with purpose.
From the First Sales to Our Own Website
I started by finding new homes for pieces from Dad's Collection through eBay.
One sale became another, and before long more than 2,200 sales had followed, along with 100% positive feedback and Top Rated Seller status.
Those numbers meant a lot to me, not simply because the business was growing, but because every sale represented another part of Dad's collection finding somebody who wanted it.
Eventually, though, I wanted more than a marketplace listing could give me.
I wanted somewhere I could tell Dad's story properly. Somewhere his collection could have its own identity. Somewhere I could explain why a particular world cinema DVD or old book mattered rather than reducing everything to a title and a price.
That became katestreasures15.co.uk.
Growing Without Forgetting Where We Started
Kate's Treasures15 has grown beyond Dad's Collection.
Today you will find new gifts, home products, seasonal finds and other carefully chosen treasures alongside Dad's films, books and music.
But I never want the website to become a collection of thousands of random products with no connection to each other.
Dad's Collection remains the heart of the business.
Everything else has grown around it.
Then Arya Came Home 🐾
On 22 December 2024, another story became part of ours.
Arya, our rescue Staffordshire Bull Terrier, came home.
She needed somewhere safe, people she could trust and the chance to simply be herself.
What we got was a loving, funny, stubborn, deeply affectionate Staffy with an enormous personality and a very firm belief that every chair, blanket and cardboard box in the house belongs to her.
Arya became part of the family very quickly.
Inevitably, she also became part of Kate's Treasures15.
She now holds the completely unofficial but apparently permanent title of Chief Drama Officer, appears throughout the website and provides the occasional opinion on products, parcels and my general standard of management.
But underneath the fun, Arya's story changed something important about the business.
Why Rescue Dogs Became Part of Our Story
Living with Arya made the idea of a second chance very real.
Rescue dogs are sometimes judged by their breed, their history or circumstances they had absolutely no control over.
Arya is a reminder every day that there is an individual dog behind those labels.
She is affectionate, sensitive, ridiculous, stubborn and completely devoted to her family.
Knowing what one second chance meant to her made it impossible for me not to think about the dogs still waiting for theirs.
Supporting Arundawn Dog Rescue
As Kate's Treasures15 continued to grow, I knew I wanted the business to do something meaningful beyond selling products.
The support comes from Kate's Treasures15 at no additional cost to the customer and helps us continue backing a cause that has become incredibly important to our family.
Arundawn Dog Rescue helps vulnerable dogs who need safety, rehabilitation, care and the opportunity to find the right home.
Some have been overlooked. Some have had difficult beginnings. Some simply need somebody willing to give them the time and chance they deserve.
That work matters enormously to me.
We also support rescue fundraising, awareness activities and community events where we can, because I want giving something back to remain part of Kate's Treasures15 as the business grows.
Dad's Legacy and Arya's Second Chance
Dad's Collection and Arya's story are obviously very different.
But somewhere along the way, I realised there is something connecting them.
Dad's treasures are things that meant something to somebody I loved. I want them to continue being valued rather than simply forgotten.
Arya is a dog who deserved to be seen for who she really was rather than judged by what came before.
Both stories, in completely different ways, are about looking beyond what is immediately in front of you and recognising that something still has value, meaning and another chapter ahead of it.
That has become the heart of Kate's Treasures15: treasured stories, memories and second chances.
And We Are Still Only at the Beginning
There are still thousands of Dad's books, DVDs, Blu-rays and CDs waiting to be catalogued, photographed and added.
There are treasures in the collection I have not even properly rediscovered yet.
There are new ideas for the website, new products, new customers and probably plenty of things that will change as Kate's Treasures15 continues to find its feet.
But there are some things I never want to change.
Dad will always be the reason this began.
His collection will always be at its heart.
Arya will almost certainly continue interfering with everything.
And I want Kate's Treasures15 to remain a business where every customer matters and where success means being able to keep Dad's story alive while doing something good along the way.
When you order from Kate's Treasures15, it genuinely means something to me.
You might be giving one of Dad's films a new home, finding a book you have searched years for, choosing a gift or simply buying something useful.
But behind that order is a small family business that exists because of somebody I loved very much.
Thank you for helping me continue the story Dad and I once talked about creating together. 💙
I apparently joined this story slightly later than everyone else.
I have been working extremely hard ever since to make up for lost time.
