This week (September 20th, 2009) we have officially been open one full year.  What a ride.  What a year to open a store.

What did Lloyd Bridges say in Airplane?  “Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit smoking”. There’s no doubt that a couple of times during the past year Kristian and I said “Looks like we picked the wrong year to open a new store”.  We opened on a Saturday, and two days later the stock market melted down and left you and I and everybody else in a deep recession.  We’ve all been navigating uncharted waters ever since.

Nevertheless, here we are a year later.  Still standing.  It hasn’t been easy, and it hasn’t always been fun… but it’s been mostly fun, and we’ve learned a lot about the new store and its fantastic group of new customers.  We’ve gotten into the art world, taken advantage of our extra space, planned and executed a bunch of different events, and taken a big ol’ yearly step toward our ultimate goal: To become part of our community.

For sure, first and foremost, we have YOU to thank.  If you are reading this – you must have been by the store at some point – and we appreciate it.  Every single customer matters, especially in this day and age, if you want to survive..

Just like Beth and I, just like Kristian, and Joe, and the rest of the hoodlums – you are in the thick of this cluster too – thinking, and worrying, and carefully analyzing how you spend every cent.  Like us, you have to spend money on food, drink, gas, and a thousand other things (990 of which are probably related to kids).  Some things don’t make the cut.

We understand.  So you can see why we feel genuinely gracious that you chose to spend some of your hard earned cash on the entertainment and art that we purvey.

We think you made the right choice.  A great album, a well-made movie (or even just some shabby cheese that makes you laugh), or a sweet piece of art can help carry your soul through tough times.  Many times throughout this year, when we were frazzled, anxious, or annoyed, we put on the music or a DVD… and soothed our souls, and remembered why we do it.

For every one of those albums or movies that you bought at Hoodlums – for every event you attended – for every tweet or email you read – we thank you.  Sincerely. See you at the Birthday Party.

Steve, Kristian, and the hoodlums at Hoodlums.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 24th, 2009 at 7:25 am and is filed under Random Babbling of a Record Store Geek, Store Observations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.