Amid the economic woes that are forcing retail stores and arts organizations alike to shut their doors, I'm excited to share some good news: the heart of Northeast Minneapolis' arts district is getting a new record store. Shuga Records, currently among the top three sellers of vintage vinyl on eBay, is leasing the former site of the Minnesota Center for Photography on 13th Avenue NE -- and opening a retail store in late May or early June. Run by my friends Adam Rosen and Danielle Nester, the shop will sell records and CDs, editioned art, books and more. Look for their new website to launch soon, with information about all they're planning, including a music-and-art blog, in-store performances and, hopefully, a Shuga Twitter account that can alert vinyl junkies about new rarities Adam's finding. Also, Shuga is talking to a local artist about commissioning the first in an annually refreshed mural for the building's west wall.
Update: Minneapolis-based artists Broken Crow, with guest OverUnder, will be creating a large-scale mural on Shuga's exterior. Update: And here's a video on the completed mural.
[Shuga on: Facebook | MySpace]
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27 comments:
Shuga is one of the most consistently, laughably overpriced record dealers on ebay. It will be interesting to see how that works out in a storefront.
Shuga is the embodiment of what sucks about buying records these days. Anytime your local spot prices some piece of crap private issue at anything above $10 you can pretty much draw a straight line back to Shuga's overpriced private terd-a-thon over on eBay. The fact that these clowns are opening a store while many longtime establishments are shuttering boggles the mind.
I'm assuming this move is to acquire more collections/records to overprice on eBay and reel in sorry suckers with no patience and/or self-control... Shame on Shuga!
Pish-posh. I'm not from Minneapolis, but I buy from Shuga frequently. Their prices are fair, for what I've purchased, and their nearly perfect ebay rating matches with my experiences. Perhaps a competitor is comment-spamming you, Paul?
If Shuga had gone about this the opposite way and run a real record shop for a few years before going to ebay, they might have avoided becoming the laughing stock of the entire record collecting community.
As it stands, they learned on the internet that RECORDS IZ BIG MONEYS! I wish I could see the jaws of good-natured Minnesotans drop when faced with $1,000 tags on Tacoma guitar records marked "PRIVATE!"
Not comment-spamming: Waxidermy's forum linked to this post. A note to the newcomers: I don't moderate comments except for ad hominem or flagrant cussin'. Keep it relatively civil and your opinions won't get nixed.
The other day I found a cool $20 record I had been looking for in an Antique Mall, it was unpriced. The store owner gets on ebay and sees that Shuga is selling it for $300 and thinks he has a fortune on his hands. Needless to say, I left the antique mall empty handed. As someone that loves music and records and takes collecting seriously, Shuga ruins it for the rest of us. I can only imagine seeing ringworn Guitar Ensemble "You n You" or whatever for $200 at a physical location. Hilarious
What's Waxidermy?
PISH POSH BATCHES
I don't get it. If the complaint is that this store's prices are too high, simply don't buy there. If you're right, the market will send him a message, forcing him to lower his prices. Apparently it hasn't. So what's the problem? He has a high volume of records, he prices them as he sees fit, and they sell. (The antique mall guy is the fool, by the way.) Is your problem with him or with the buyers who are spending more than you can? And would there be such high dudgeon if he was getting the same prices on ebay auctions as he has for his buy-it-now sales?
Bunch of haters. Nothing new in the record "community".
Yes I have also been buying Lps from shuga for 3 years now. Every time it's perfect in every way. Shuga is a strict grader and does not sell the shit records that most Mlps stores sell. What store anywhere in Mlps can you even find loads of mint vintage records. Also shuga sells there new Reissues for about $1-2 less then anywhere else. The problem with all the haters here is they are just jealous of shuga's success.
I Have only known Adam for a 6+ years and he knows more about music and where to find the best is unkown samples and breaks. Does everyone understand that Adam was Dj in Chicago for over 8 years. the problem with this blog Is that all the "haters" as u people call them are old farts that only know the old music. Shuga is the king in mind of music.
J. Tyler
Anonymous said...
Bunch of haters. Nothing new in the record "community".
Hey Shugs, not nice to post anonymously on your own blog.
Anonymous [7:32]
This isn't Adam's blog. It's mine. And anyone's free to post anonymously, as you so eloquently just demonstrated.
Sure, Shuga can set his own prices, he's free to do so. But the fact is, this dude finds a record, checks it on popsike, and either a) marks it up 50% of the highest price there or b) if it's not listed, assumes it is some insane rarity he has discovered (which in truth seasoned collectors have already known about, and shuga is simply ill-informed). Shuga, where did you come up with such a retarded name?
I've been lurking at the Waxidermy BBS for awhile, and it's clear its readers aren't going to give Shuga Records a fair shot (the first clue is the "let's trash this guy, not Daptone" comment at the start of the thread). It's populated by online record sellers who apparently aren't doing so well, ebay entrepreneurs who haven't quite made it, and record collectors who fancy themselves pros but aren't. And, of course, Shuga Records competitors who'll trash anyone, with or without reason, in hopes of protecting their own businesses. Think the comic book store owner on the Simpson's.
I say good luck to any endeavor that's homegrown and thriving and, god forbid, opening a store in these crappy economic times.
Cameron
SHUGA STOP POSTING UNDER PSEUDONYMS.
Cameron.
I think it's great he's opening a store. I think it's great he loves records. The fact of the matter though, from a seller who is not "struggling" or a "hater" is that his pricing "system" is ludicrous and he'd actually be making more money if he halved the majority of prices he places on records. If he uses the same pricing structure in his shop as he does online, the shop will close, unless that shop focuses on his main seller, which is handbags and other accessories and not records. Sorry to keep it real here, but I like to see stores survive, not fail.
Shuga's pricing scheme is a clever gaming of ebay and its "best offer" system -- he prices way, way high in the hopes of getting an offer that may still be subtantially more than the actual value. If you look at some the more ludicrous items he currently has for sale, like a $500 LP that is really worth $25 or $30, you'll see that it's been on sale for many months and may have a couple of rejected offers on it. If someone offers him $300 they may feel like they're getting a bargain, and Shuga makes off with a big profit. The buyer is happy, at least until he sees the same album for sale for a fraction of the price paid to Shuga. Still, I imagine he sells more designer handbags than high dollar LPs.
So what does "really worth" mean? It's like pricing art. Is a Basquiat "really worth" $10 million just because someone pays that much for it? It's just paint and canvas after all.
It's not at all like pricing art, because records are mass-produced. In fact, very few of Shuga's listings are rare in the sense that a true rarity is - something that there's only 1 or 2 known to be in existence. An artist's painting is a one-of-one, a unique item. Even the rarest records are hardly that. Shuga may sell a $5 record for $50, that doesn't make $50 "the price". It just means that there's someone who's either uninformed enough, or wealthy enough, to pay an inflated rate. It wouldn't have been the first time someone shined up shit and called it gold.
Fine art sales is a whole different ballgame. "Really worth" means "market price" which is usually not too difficult to determine with the help of google/ebay/popsike/etc.
Shuga has a copy of the Minuteflag record up with a price tag of $600 Buy It Now. This is so far beyond ridiculous for what is, at best, a $5-$20 record that it's hard to fathom how anyone can defend it.
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The real issue here is one of rarity, clarity and location.
For example, I was looking for a rock group that only made 1000 albums. Shuga had the album- Score one for Shuga! The album was in excellent condition-Score two for Shuga! Finally, the location was within the metro area-Score three for Shuga! No matter how anyone feels about the prices, the real issue is one of RARITY, CLARITY and LOCATION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
My only question is this, if your looking for records just for records sake, why not shop Half Price Books?
Unless ONLY Shuga has it! Think about it! I did.
I'm excited about the storefront. I used to live very close to Shuga records. It's an asset to the community-- it's the only record store in NE that I know about. The area is full of nice music venues and other "alternative culture" type things, and I'm glad they finally have a record store.
Yes, some of the records are expensive, but the storefront also has a large selection of cheaper priced records. The records in the storefront are very comparable to the other MPLS record stores like Cheapo, Heimes, and the Root Celler (RIP) with the added bonus of access to a plethora of rare vinyls that are expensive but priced fairly. I'm most a bluegrasses, myself, and I have seen records listed in the store that I didn't know I could find in Minneapolis. If you don't like Shuga records, go somewhere else.
And, if you're in North or Northeast Minneapolis, that "somewhere else" may be 5-10 miles away.
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