Kids grow out of clothes, shoes, and gear faster than most families can keep up with, and Once Upon A Child in Regina turns that reality into an affordable, sustainable shopping model rather than a source of waste. As the local, independently owned Regina location of the national Once Upon A Child brand, the store buys and sells gently used kids clothing, shoes, toys, baby gear, books, and furniture, giving parents a place to both offload outgrown items and stock up on what comes next, often in the same visit.
The buy-sell-trade model at the center of the business is what distinguishes it most clearly from a standard secondhand or thrift store. Parents can bring in lightly used children’s items and receive payment on the spot, with no appointment required and buying happening year-round rather than during limited seasonal windows. That immediate, no-hassle payment structure has made Once Upon A Child a go-to option for families looking to declutter quickly without the wait times associated with consignment stores, where sellers typically have to wait for an item to sell before seeing any return. On the buying side, shoppers can find kids merchandise priced up to 70 percent below standard retail, a meaningful discount for families managing the near-constant cycle of replacing clothing and gear as children grow.
The Regina store carries the full range one would expect from a children’s resale outlet: everyday clothing basics, shoes across a range of sizes, books, toys, and larger baby gear items like car seats, strollers, and furniture pieces that are expensive to buy new but often barely used before a child outgrows them. That breadth means the store functions as a one-stop option for many of the bigger-ticket needs of early parenthood, not just clothing, which is part of why families tend to return again and again rather than treating it as a one-time stop.
This location has earned Gold Standard Store recognition within the Once Upon A Child network, a designation tied to meeting the brand’s operational standards across inventory quality, customer service, and store presentation. Being independently owned and operated, while still connected to a larger, established franchise system, gives the Regina store both local accountability and the benefit of a well-known, trusted brand that Regina parents may already recognize from other cities.
Once Upon A Child Regina keeps some of the longest hours of any resale shop in the city, open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., a schedule built around the reality that parents often need to shop for kids items in the evening or on weekends rather than during a typical workday. That accessibility, combined with the year-round buy-back program, makes it easy for busy families to fit both selling and shopping into whatever pocket of free time they actually have.
Beyond the convenience and savings, the model carries a clear environmental benefit: every gently used item resold through the store is one less item manufactured new and one more year of useful life kept out of the landfill, a meaningful recycling effort given how quickly children’s belongings turn over. For Regina families managing the fast pace of a growing child’s needs, Once Upon A Child offers a reliable, budget-friendly, and genuinely sustainable alternative to buying everything new, open seven days a week to make that kind of shopping easy to fit into daily life.
