About us

Varusteleka (pronounced [Where's the liquor?] and loosely translates to Gear Hammer) is an army and outdoor store from Finland. We have a walk-in store in Helsinki and we serve online customers worldwide. What does this Varusteleka mean? Varusteleka is obviously Finnish and comes from "varuste", which means equipment or gear, and "leka" which means a sledgehammer, or a bottle of booze in slang.

The company was established in 2003 and has become the biggest army store in Europe. Our crew has over 70 professional members, and our turnout in 2022 was 23.13 Million €.

Not only do we have thousands of interesting items, but we spend a lot of time of describing them accurately. As a natural result of having experience with this stuff and a mission to do things right, we created our own brands: Särmä, Särmä TST, and Terävä.

Customers will be attended to even after the purchase, that's how good our service is. We take pride in our skill and experience: you will have hard time finding a better military surplus store than Varusteleka.

Values

Mission

  • Take tasks head-on
  • Do something you can be proud of
  • Share knowledge and experiences

Vision

  • Total world domination
  • We are forerunners, internationally known, growing and profitable company

Birth of Varusteleka

Everything began back in 2003. I was 21 years old, had just gotten into the University of Helsinki to study Finnish and was sorely disappointed with the quality of Finnish army surplus stores; the selection was poor and online shops either didn't exist or were so bad you wished they didn't. With the support of my family, I took the first careful steps on the path of private entrepreneurship in the guise of a small online shop. I coded a simple online shop in which I concentrated on proper product descriptions, took a one thousand euro loan and ordered as much Bundeswehr and US issue as the money could buy. Along with the webshop, I had a very rusty van that acted as a walk-in store for the first brave cash customers.

After that things took off like a greyhound after a rabbit, so I ended my studies the same year I started and paid my loan in record time. I had my work cut out for me as I tended to run out of kit much faster than I was able to restock and had a chronic storage capacity problem, not to mention the seemingly endless supply of army kit junkies who just wouldn't take no for an answer. Fancy business premises have never held much interest for me, so Varusteleka has always been situated in places where you wouldn't usually find a shop. I still have vivid memories of a time when I'd keep the shop open until six o'clock, blissfully unaware that the evening watchman had locked the door at four. The current shop is larger and better equipped than many conventional clothes stores, though it is still located in a warehouse hall in the Konala industrial estate in Helsinki. Judging by the never-ending stream of customers, this does not seem to bother people overly much and at least the store is big enough.

The biggest reform in Varusteleka history was when I decided to throw caution to the wind and get real, full-time employees, and pay them in real money instead of the traditional squirrel skins and steel helmets. When things were no longer limited by how much I as an individual could do, the proverbial manure really hit the windmill. Since then we've been steadily employing more and more people. Where once there was only me and a tired van, there now stand over 70 efficient, knowledgeable, and enthusiastic employees ready and able to serve. Indeed, it might be said that this high-quality workforce is the main reason for Varusteleka's epic rise to power - through some strange chain of events, I seem to have managed to cheat, coerce and tempt some exceptional individuals to work for me. What makes our success even more remarkable is the fact that we do everything ourselves: graphics, marketing, writing, web pages, accounting, product testing, all of it. Not bad for a bunch of layabouts who've had to figure it all out for themselves, huh?

In its current state Varusteleka is quite big, and it has gotten that way in much the same way snowballs do: slowly and by itself without any outside money, and accelerating all the time. This is very important for me personally, since I never got into this for the money, but rather so I could do stuff as I liked and build a business as well as I am able to. I'm proud of the fact that in this era of big money and investor shit, you can create something big from scratch by simply rolling up your sleeves and doing things well.

The success of my shop must say something about my countrymen - how can we exist in a country this small, selling mostly to the Finnish? By 2010 Varusteleka had become so big it's probably the biggest in Europe, and might well be the biggest one in the world, at least when it comes to surplus-selling stores. The funny thing is that the vast majority of our customers live in Finland, so, unlike our European "competitors", we only have some five million potential customers. Maybe it's our harsh climate, or maybe Finns just have a taste for getting better stuff for less, who knows.

Varusteleka is still primarily an online shop - all our products can be found on our home page, and we're quite honest (some might say brutally so) when it comes to product descriptions. We send orders ridiculously quickly, and if you didn't like what you got, returning it is free (provided you live in Finland). This does not even remotely mean that our walk-in store has been neglected though, quite the opposite in fact, and not least because one million people, give or take, live near it and to pop in to say hi every once in a while. Despite numerous appeals from the public, it is not as of yet realistic for us to set up stores anywhere else in Finland. This does, however, mean that our storehouse and walk-in store are on the same premises, which in turn means that every product you can find on our web page can also be bought from the walk-in store.

- Valtteri Lindholm

Staff

  • Valtteri

    Valtteri

    With us since 2003. Class: Entrepreneur.

    "It's pointless to blame me for anything, I'm always on the good guys' side. "
  • Samu

    Samu

    With us since 2006. Class: WEB/DEV/Photographer.

  • Sampo

    Sampo

    With us since 2007. Class: Development Manager.

    "Adventurer, wizard, hero."
  • Sauli

    Sauli

    With us since 2009. Class: Copywriter and product wizard.
  • Toni

    Toni

    With us since 2009. Class: Chief of Sales & Marketing Officer.

    "Gotta make a buck!"
  • Teemu

    Teemu

    With us since 2010. Class: Receivals.

    "Minor league doorkicker."
  • Oku

    Oku

    With us since 2010. Class: Customer Service wizard.

    "Ye olde customer support worker."
  • Valtteri

    Valtteri

    With us since 2011. Class: The Shop's desigated "somebody".

    "Kiki's birthday!"
  • Tero

    Tero

    With us since 2011. Class: Sales Manager.
  • Essi

    Essi

    With us since 2011. Class: Product Manager.
  • Marianna

    Marianna

    With us since 2011. Class: Customer service.
  • Mira

    Mira

    With us since 2013. Class: HR specialist.

    "Fluffiness, cats and coffee."
  • Suvi

    Suvi

    With us since 2013. Class: Supply Chain Director.
  • Tuomas

    Tuomas

    With us since 2013. Class: Receivals.
  • Maria

    Maria

    With us since 2014. Class: Jämä Manager.
  • Magnus

    Magnus

    With us since 2015. Class: Customer Service.
  • J-P

    J-P

    With us since 2015. Class: Warehouse.
  • Miro

    Miro

    With us since 2015. Class: Outbound logistics.
  • Tea

    Tea

    With us since 2016. Class: Supply chain assistant.
  • Jari

    Jari

    With us since 2016. Class: CEO.
  • Jukka

    Jukka

    With us since 2017. Class: Controller.
  • Niklas

    Niklas

    With us since 2017. Class: Business Development Assistant.
  • Olli

    Olli

    With us since 2018. Class: Analytics and Business Development.
  • Lauri

    Lauri

    With us since 2018. Class: Analytics and Marketing.
  • Luca

    Luca

    With us since 2019. Class: Shop assistant.
  • Mika

    Mika

    With us since 2019. Class: Shop assistant.
  • Inka

    Inka

    With us since 2019. Class: Customer service.
  • Veera

    Veera

    With us since 2019. Class: Propaganda Wizard.
  • Arne

    Arne

    With us since 2019. Class: Warehouse.
  • Anna

    Anna

    With us since 2019. Class: Product Development Manager.
  • Olli

    Olli

    With us since 2016. Class: Shop assistant.
  • Elina

    Elina

    With us since 2016. Class: Sourcing Director.
  • Kai

    Kai

    With us since 2016. Class: Copywriter.
  • Marja

    Marja

    Lekalainen vuodesta 2019. Luokka: Amazon sales manager.
  • Perttu

    Perttu

    With us since 2020. Luokka: Customer service.
  • Alexandros

    Alexandros

    With us since 2020. Class: Shop assistant.
  • Iiro

    Iiro

    With us since 2020. Class: Shop assistant.
  • Akseli

    Akseli

    With us since 2020. Class: Shop assistant.
  • Joni

    Joni

    With us since 2020. Class: Warehouse.
  • Sampo-Antti

    Sampo-Antti

    With us since 2020. Class: Warehouse.
  • Elena

    Elena

    With us since 2020. Class: Buyer.
  • Suvi

    Suvi

    With us since 2020.
  • Anna

    Anna

    With us since 2020. Class: Sotima
  • Noora

    Noora

    With us since 2021. Class: Shop assistant.
  • AB

    AB

    With us since 2021. Class: Shop assistant.
  • Minja

    Minja

    With us since 2021. Class: Irresponsibility coordinator.
  • Marten

    Marten

    With us since 2021. Class: Shop assistant.
  • Niklas

    Niklas

    With us since 2021. Class: Shop assistant
  • Simo

    Simo

    With us since 2021. Class: Copywriter

    "I can't believe I ate the whole thing."
  • Manu

    Manu

    With us since 2021. Class: Warehouse

    Forever lost
  • Olli

    Olli

    With us since 2022. Class: Warehouse
  • Okko

    Okko

    With us since 2022. Class: Warehouse
  • Jaakko

    Jaakko

    With us since 2022. Class: Warehouse
  • Jesse

    Jesse

    With us since 2022. Class: Warehouse
  • Anssi

    Anssi

    With us since 2022. Class: Battle Captain

    Progression ends in satisfaction.
  • Janne

    Janne

    With us since 2022. Class: Conttori

    Urea iacta est
  • Anna

    Anna

    With us since 2022.
  • Markus

    Markus

    With us since 2022.
  • Heli

    Heli

    With us since 2022.
  • Antti

    Antti

    With us since 2022. Class: Customer service
  • Otto

    Otto

    With us since 2022. Class: Shop assistant
  • Maria

    Maria

    With us since 2022. Class: Customer service
  • Sini

    Sini

    With us since 2023. Class: Product designer
  • Boy

    Boy

    With us since 2016. Class: Shop mannequin.

Company info

Founded in 2003. Situated in Finland. Owned by His Majesty, Valtteri Lindholm. CEO Jari Laine. Varusteleka's address is Hankasuontie 11 A, 00390 Helsinki, Finland. All our functions are located in the same premises. Business ID: 2082907-8. EU VAT number: FI20829078.

In 2018, we handled and shipped 259,213 orders to 83 countries.

The history of Varusteleka

Go and check out the history of Varusteleka from the 20 years of Varusteleka -page! We have listed a few milestones through the years both in good and in a few controversies, too.

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