In some respects, Larry Pierson would be an unlikely record store owner.
Born in 1970, Pierson’s interest in popular music in general, and heavy metal in particular, didn’t emerge until he was about 12 years old, which roughly coincided with the transition of recorded music from vinyl records and eight-track tapes to cassettes.
Before that change, record stores in Columbus were plentiful – Newsoms (later Camelot) in Leigh Mall, Elysian Fields, Fraction, Caldwell Furniture Record Rack and Bryan’s Records and Pets. The record store wasn’t merely a place to buy the latest album, it was a gathering place for teens and young adults in the 1960s and 1970s. Record stores were part of the culture.
As the change in formats took hold, one by one, the record stores began to close. The last holdout in Columbus was Bryan’s Records and Pets, which stayed open until 2012.
By then, the return of vinyl records had already started among a small group of aficionados, growing steadily through the 2010s. The Recording Industry Association of America RIAA published a revenue report for 2022 that showed vinyl accounted for $1.2 billion in sales, marking the first instance of vinyl sales growth outpacing CD sales growth since 1987. Last year, Taylor Swift’s re-recorded version of “1989” produced sales of 1,014,000 vinyl records, a sure sign that vinyl is no longer a niche market.
To accommodate the emerging market, record stores and shops began to pop up all across the country. Scott “Scooter” Thomas opened Scooter’s Records in Starkville in 2017.
Now, Columbus has a record store for the first time in 12 years. Earlier this month, Pierson, 52, opened his record store, Rockin’ Records and More, on Highway 45 North, across the highway from Jackson Square Shopping Center.
Pierson’s entry in the vinyl record business doesn’t reflect any nostalgic yearning.
“By the time I really started getting into music in the ‘80s, (vinyl) records had pretty much dropped out,” Pierson said. “So my decision to open a record store wasn’t about that.”
The influences that led to opening Rockin’ Records were a desire to own a business that reflected his love of music, along with his son’s burgeoning interest in vinyl, Pierson said.
“My wife, Jennifer, had been talking about opening our own business for several years,” Pierson said. “I’ve had a lot of jobs, but none of them were something I was passionate about. I wanted to do something I loved, and music has always been a passion of mine.”
A self-proclaimed “guitar nerd,” he initially thought of opening a music store.
“I liked the idea of owning a music store, but we had Jerry’s Music Store here, so I thought maybe it would be better to open something we didn’t have here in town. My son, Rob, was a vinyl lover and had been collecting vinyl records for a while. He was a big influence in our decision to open the record store.”
Vinyl lovers are generally divided into two camps: older folks for whom vinyl records have a nostalgic appeal, and younger people who are drawn to the unique sound and the more personal relationships between the listener and the performer that vinyl offers.
“It’s a warmer sound that you don’t get with the digitized sound,” Pierson said. “Then there is the art on the album covers and the liner notes, which means you can have an experience that goes beyond just listening. I can see why people love albums.”
Pierson’s inventory ranges from somewhere between 3,500 and 4,000 albums, more or less equally divided between new releases on used records, which he finds online from sources like eBay and Facebook Marketplace.
Those used albums are the key to being profitable, Pierson said.
“The mark-up on new vinyl is only about 25%, so you really can’t make a living just selling new records,” he said. “You still have to have them, but the way you make it successful is finding those old albums, knowing if it’s a good price and what you can make off them. I think that’s something I do pretty well.”
Pierson hopes that he can establish the business and eventually turn it over to his son.
“Rob graduates from (Mississippi University for Women) this semester and this is as much for him as it is for myself and his mom,” he said. “We want this to be a business he can make a living off of. So the bottom line is still the bottom line. This isn’t about getting rich. That’s not going to happen with this kind of business. But if you can make a living doing it, that will be worth it.”
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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