The Mannheim Store

With online shopping at an all-time high and still rising, many experts say that brick-and-mortar retail is going to die. Or at least it will drastically change. We are an online store. We like online shopping. It's pure luxury to sit comfortably on the couch and browse through the products you like. But we also like the experience of discovering new areas, going into a store, and getting a real feel for what it's all about. Touching, feeling, and trying on clothes is very important, especially when it's vintage, where a size medium garment from the 90s can fit like a 3XL today. Also, a good store has much more to tell, more profile and character than an online store ever can. Since we conceived Double Double more as a brand and less as an online store, we tried to convey our message and tell a story. We show things we like and emphasize things that are important to us. And we also identified with the things we didn't want to do, things we didn't want to sell. But there are certain limits to an online store.

It's different with a real store. You can tell a story through the look and feel of the store. We always had an idea of what our vintage store should look like. Clothes racks that offered enough space to browse. Walls filled with 90s collectibles, almost like a museum. A room where you can also hang out, read a good book or play old video games with friends. So when we got the chance to move into the iconic old laundromat in Mannheim's vibrant Jungbusch district, we were super excited to finally be able to turn our vision into reality and actually tell the story we wanted to tell.

When we got the keys on September 13th, the whole store was quite a mess. We planned our opening for October 5th, which gave us exactly 3 weeks to get everything ready and organize a decent opening event. The 3 weeks were, to say the least, quite strenuous. Luckily, over the years we had already collected a whole lot of old furniture and tons of memorabilia, which were now finally to be taken out of their boxes. Toys, posters, books and all sorts of other stuff. Over the years, we simply bought everything we liked and that matched our vibe. We didn't really know why. We just liked collecting beautiful things. But now we know.

One week before the opening, we were thrilled to hear that the Berlin-based rapper and one of our long-time favorite artists, Juju Rogers, would be performing at our opening. The opening, including his performance, meant a lot to us. Seeing people understand our vision really made this a big milestone for us. Many thanks to everyone who came and showed their love. And thanks to all our friends and family who helped us!



We've only been here for a month and I'm not saying we've made it. Not at all. In fact, we can't live off all this yet. But the fact that we open our store every day is somewhat surreal for us. Even though our contract is only until the end of January for now. Many thanks to everyone who has supported us on our journey so far. But this is just the beginning. There are tons of things we want to improve, ideas we want to pursue, projects we want to realize and much more. We hope you will join us!