I only took one, and it's on my phone. From their FB page:
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That's just the front part. If you followed the bar to the left, there's a side part with tables. They are "giving us" a table, meaning we can decorate on the wall next to the table however we want. They are talking about doing a "vinyl night" on Wednesdays, which is already BOGO night. We would lend a turntable and a few starter records, people can bring their own records to play on the turntable. Thinking about that.
The landlord thing: We've mostly had a decent relationship. I was their property manager for a few years. They have a history of playing hardball at first, but then coming around to see reason. I'm hoping for that. They've never "gone after" anyone who broke the lease while I was property manager, but it was never more than a few months before the end of the lease. (People would lose their deposits and just consider it rent.) I have 11 months left.
When they replaced me as prop manager (because I opened my second store and couldn't be on property as often) I had just signed a two year extension. I objected to that (as I'd no longer have the PM deduction) and they said I could break the lease if I wanted, and that the lease was more to protect me than them.
But several months ago, when I suggested shrinking the store (it's technically two units, so going from two to one) they balked. They wanted replacements before letting me out, and suggested the rent on the remaining unit would go up.
Recently, their realtor told me they had someone interested in one side, and as of today, that side will be empty. On Wednesday, he told me someone else was interested in the other side, but they wanted it August 1. I said let me try to figure out if I can get both sides cleared out by then - it would be a pretty huge task, and I had nowhere to go yet. (The place I was originally going to move to months ago couldn't wait any longer and took in a different tenant in the meantime.)
After signing with the new place on Friday, I immediately called the realtor to let him know I could be out by 8/15 at the latest, possibly 7/31, thinking that would be awesome (since he had a second interested party.) But he said, "Oh, that deal fell through." Then he got pretty surprisingly adversarial about it, saying, "Don't put me in the middle of this, Tony" and to talk to the landlords. (In the meantime, I told the property manager, since it was late on a Friday.)
I picked up the trailer and moved some stuff into the new location already that same night - to continue emptying the unit that needs to be empty today.
Other than sheer luck, there is no realistic way to perfectly time someone moving in, and moving an established record store out in the blink of an eye. There's going to be a gap. I have a feeling they're going to make me pay for the gap by keeping my deposit and/or last month's rent. (Considering I just put down another first, last, and security unexpectedly on Friday, I'm broke for the summer lol. And have to spend on labor and fixtures to get everything set up.)
This is a crazy timeframe, but I'd like to get out of the old place completely by 7/31, and at least soft opened in the new place before I leave for New Orleans (business trip) on 8/4. Yes, today is the 15th. LOL. Have to go down to the City and do all the paperwork this morning (licenses, etc.) and it looks like Wednesday will be a big moving day, moving hopefully about a third of the inventory - leaving the current store functional in the meantime.
That's the idea. I just did my June sales tax last night, so the numbers are fresh in my head. The old store took a dive from 2017 to 2018, beginning around March 2018, and averaging a 20-30% drop for most of the rest of the year. 2019 has seen an improvement (with effort) but usually not back up to 2017 levels.
Meanwhile the new store opened in late 2017. Both stores did great at the same time for months, so I did not think one was cannibalizing the other (they're 10 miles apart.) But to use June as an example: old store down about 32% from 2017 to 2018, up about 15% from 2018 to 2019 (so still below 2017.) Meanwhile, new store beat old store's 2017 in 2018, and grew a full 45% from 2018 to 2019. Old store hit the ceiling, new store is way better and still at the floor. **I need two of those** LOL.
I paid attention to what made the new store work better and tried to incorporate it into our "new old" location: relevant neighbors, big shared parking lot, more foot traffic, a big, open floor plan, expanding certain genres, etc.
Very, very good feeling about the new place. Getting it to work the way the previous new place does would change everything. Plus Brian's recent promotion, maybe in a year we could finally be "not struggling" as much.
Just trying not to lose +/- $3K on my way out the door. Or worse if they don't get tenants for a year. (New tenants are coming in several hundred dollars a month higher than what I was paying, so I don't see a downside for them. It's just a matter of if they want to be hard headed or not.)
(Nothing wrong with the juices mentioned above -- just adding the comment about water, too.)
