Temple Slug

We’re the one of the oldest retailers of futons in the United States. Our secret? Offering quality products, friendly and knowledgeable service, style, selection, and value. Temple Slug also carries a selection of quality waterbed supplies as the oldest continuous waterbed retailer in America. Established on April Fool’s Day in 1970, the Slug has grown from its origins as a hippie shop and waterbed retailer to offer a modern selection of futons, home furnishings and decor, gifts, incense, oils, candles, and greeting cards with appeal to traditional and multicultural tastes. Temple Slug — Original. Since 1970. Visit Temple Slug — celebrating 35 years in business.

We opened our doors on April Fool’s Day in 1970 to sell cards, incense, records, posters, books, clothing, and other bric-a-brac associated with the spirit of those times. We continue to serve multiple generations of customers as we approach our 39th anniversary this year. Our Name A group of people in San Francisco during the late ’60s were going to open a flea market in an abandoned trolley station in the Russian Quarter. Since the station had a big domed roof, they were going to call it “Temple Slug.” They never opened the market, so rather than waste a great name, we adopted it. Soon our customers were just calling us “The Slug”. Three months later someone drove up to the front of our store with a plastic sack filled with water. People in California were sleeping on this “water bed.” We bought some boards at the lumberyard to build a box around it and placed it in the black light room of our basement. Soon people were coming from surrounding states to try out this strange object.