We recently connected with David Williams and have shared our conversation below.

David, appreciate you joining us today. So, naming is such a challenge. How did you come up with the name of your brand?

I grew up on Long Island, NY and moved to the East Bay outside of Berkeley, CA in 1971. I started going to concerts when I was 14 on Long Island and spent most weekends at Winterland, San Francisco seeing Bill Graham shows in the 70s. My high school best friend and I started a band called Argus while I was in high school. I also started getting very interested in guitars and especially old guitars.

I ended up going to college at the University of Virginia. My family is from Virginia and established roots in Jamestown in 1699. While in college, I was still very focused on music and live shows. My Junior and Senior years I booked all of the major shows for UVa and planned to go off and work in NY for one of the big talent agencies. Life didn’t quite go that way, and I ended up using my engineering degree to move into manufacturing engineering in the defense business.

I still went to many live shows in Maryland and DC where I was working. I had some money with a real job and bought a few old guitars. In the late 80s I was managing procurement for a large defense contract. I traveled to the key suppliers regularly and in some cases ended up managing the project at select companies. One of those suppliers was outside of Atlanta, GA and the sales manager, Bruce Hudson and I became close friends. We would stop at guitars stores and pawn shops after business was completed. We ended up one weekend at the Atlanta Guitar Show. I had just visited with Leo Fender now of G&L guitars and on the way out Bruce and I looked at each other and said “we can do this”. That was the birth of my business in 1989.

We started buying and selling old guitars and amplifiers at guitar shows up and down the East Coast. This was before the Internet so people would bring their instruments to sell at the shows. We did not have a name and I lived in Monkton Maryland. We chose the name Monkton Guitars as it was unique.

Bruce and I were partners for 6 years in Baltimore. I had another partner, Mike Koontz in 1996 and 1997.

I moved to Boulder, CO in 1997 to work for Ball Aerospace and moved my business to my home. By this time the Internet was becoming a vehicle to sell goods and I started selling on-line. Brit Heaps of Wildwood Guitars helped me design my web site. It was modeled after the Wildwood Guitars format.

I ran the guitar business on the side from my home and in my day job I rose to Director level at CenturyLink. In November 2017 my son took his life and my life took a significant turn. I decided I wanted to get out of the corporate world and focus full time on the guitar business. In March of 2019 I retired from CenturyLink and opened a brick and mortar store called Monkton Guitars in Broomfield.

I used my own finances to fund the store and did not borrow money. My goal was to have a neighborhood store like the ones I used to visit in the 70s and 80s. I brought my expertise in vintage instruments and started to also carry new instruments. My friends at Wildwood Guitars helped me land agreements with some of the major guitar suppliers.

When I opened the store I thought about changing the name. I had used the name Monkton Guitars for close to 30 years by that time. It was a brand and something I had cultivated since 1989. People in the vintage world knew my store so it made sense to carry-on with the name. People always want to know if I am Mr. Monkton and a few from Maryland make the connection.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers?

Monkton Guitars was a side business for me for over 30 years. In 2019, I made a choice to focus on the business full time and opened a brick and mortar store in Broomfield, CO

I have always focused on the customer and dealing with people fairly and honestly. That mantra is how my store is run and based on almost tripling revenue in three years, that seems to resonate with my customers.

Monkton Guitars is an unusual name and most people are not sure how to pronounce it. At the end of the day it makes me unique and having a 30+ year legacy is something I am proud of.

I celebrated my 3 year anniversary in April. The store has grown into one of the major boutique guitar stores in the Denver area. We carry over 200 guitars along with amps, effects pedals and accessories. I have 2 repair techs who do excellent work. The repair business has grown steadily, helped by offering repair services to customers during the pandemic. I am still selling on-line and that makes up 45% of my business. We sell a large amount of consigned gear including some very rare pieces from 1890s to 1940s.

People who buy guitars like to try them out. Monkton Guitars has a heavy focus on finding customers the right instrument. My customers comment all of the time that they like to buy local and that my shop is fun to visit.

That formula is working and the business continues to grow.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

I self funded my business. I had a college fund for my son that I had been saving for since he was 3. That fund carried him through two and half years of college and would have supported him through graduate school. When my son died in 2017 I had a fairly significant fund to draw from. I discussed opening the business with my financial planner and he felt I had ample funds to start the business and only needed to break even to survive.

I used the funds to buy into an initial inventory and then rolled the money back into the business. I took little salary the first 2 years and have now started paying myself. I also rolled my business from a small business sole proprietorship to an S-1 corporation.

We’d love to hear the story of how you turned a side-hustle into a something much bigger.

My business has been a side hustle for close to 30 years. I ran the business as a hobby/business and bought and sold guitars at guitar shows. Very similar to many antique dealers. My mother was an antique dealer so I caught the bug from her.

With my side hustle I always made money but nothing significant. My wife always blamed the business for causing us to pay taxes yearly. I generally made about $40K yearly and always rolled the money back into the business. It was fun, but always a side hustle.

In 2019 I quit/retired from my Director job at CenturyLink and focused on running the side hustle full-time. I was able to get a compensation package so my first year was helped by severance pay. I ended up breaking even in 2019. 2020 was the pandemic. I was selling on-line so I was in a good position to continue to generate revenue. I was one of the only guitar stores open for curbside sales and repairs so I drew in a great local base of customers.

I ended up making money in 2020 and had a profit for the business.

In 2021 things all came together. The side hustle was now a 6 day/week business. I had always been a sole proprietorship and paid taxes on the business under my income. In 2021 I moved the business into an S-1 Corporation and now pay myself a salary and file taxes as a business. I doubled the business in 2021 and my little side hustle is now a successful full time business.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.monktonguitars.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/monktonguitarsco/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/monktonguitarsLLC/
• Other: email: [email protected] Reverb: https://reverb.com/shop/monkton-guitars www.musicstorebroomfield.com

Image Credits
I took all of these photos. David Williams. I have permission for the subjects to share the photos.