ORANGE — Fran and Mike Bates had barely opened their new store over the summer when Facebook suspended the business’ page for two days. It turns out the social media network’s algorithm thought the name was sexually explicit.

But the Orange couple promises you, Bates Down Under at 90 New Athol Road is simply an indoor flea market selling used furniture, knickknacks and items from various vendors.

“It adds another whole level of stuff that we don’t necessarily carry or don’t necessarily collect or sell,” Mike Bates said about the shop’s roughly 10 vendors, adding that spaces are still available.

The owners opened Bates Crafters Gallery at Hillcrest Plaza in August 2018 and have since moved that shop next door to 80 New Athol Road. For about three years they have held outdoor flea markets with multiple vendors in the plaza and some of those vendors now rent space at Bates Down Under — a retail space with a name referencing the fact that it is next door to the crafters gallery and accessible through a side door toward the back of the building.

“It’s caught on,” Mike Bates said. “A lot of people are coming out. They like it and they like our prices.”

The store offers a smorgasbord of items ranging from used furniture, DVDs, video games, lamps, and trinkets linked to the history of Orange and Athol. One vendor’s case has buttons from the River Rat Races of years past as well as the American bicentennial in 1976. The case also bears a metal pin apparently presented to former Orange Police Officer Carlton W. Spear, who died in January 2006, and one pertaining to the former Climax Electric Works in New Salem.

Bates Down Under also sports a backroom in which every item costs $1 (and you can buy 12 items for $10) as well as a section where the proceeds from all sales benefit North Quabbin Regional Animal Control. A space upstairs (which until last year housed Cookies and Dreams Bakery) is used to store and display used furniture.

The Bates had a proverbial “vault,” which stored their antique and vintage merchandise “and if we ever get a dresser or two they (sold) immediately. So we just determined that there was a need for furniture in the area,” Fran Bates explained.

She mentioned the two-day suspension on Facebook was terrifying and she got the account reactivated only after asking the social media platform for a review.

“It was scary,” she said, adding that social media is critical for a small business. “I post almost every day. I answer questions all day long.”

In fact, Mike Bates said a customer suggested the business name via Facebook.

“We thought it was kind of catchy,” he said. The kangaroos on the store’s logo are a reference to Australia, known as “the land down under” because of its position in the Southern Hemisphere.

Both Bates Down Under and Bates Crafters Gallery are open Thursday through Sunday. Information about hours is available on their Facebook pages.

Reach Domenic Poli at: dpoli@recorder.com or 413-930-4120.

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