We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Greg Henderson a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Greg, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s jump right into the heart of things. Outsiders often think businesses or industries have much larger profit margins than they actually do – the reason is that outsiders are often unaware of the biggest challenges to profitability in various industries – what’s the biggest challenge to profitability in your industry?
The biggest challenge a small brick and mortar guitar faces is cash flow and inventory management . With the advent of the internet, Ebay, Reverb, Craigslist and Marketplace, everyone and anyone can be a guitar dealer they think. One more thing that never gets mentioned about marketplace and Craigslist is they do not pay sales tax so I know you are helping your personal situation but hurting your community by avoiding sales tax! Brick and mortars are closing due to the Amazons and others but I also feel we can thrive by creating new ways to get folks in , make them part of a video, or carry items that are not as common as others ! But you have to demonstrate and be versed on them to get folks to try them !
Greg, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
At Atlanta Vintage Guitars or AVG as we call it for short, we look for affordable vintage guitars, sometimes our guitars have had changes such as pickups or been refretted or refinished, or maybe totally stock, we go thru and tell you the good the bad and the ugly on each vintage piece we sell. We also look for things that are great that you may never have heard of, such as Kepma, Jet or Vintage Brand Guitars, and try to keep great pedal effects from Strymon. JHS, Joyo and gently used pedals from others !!! I am very proud of our work on guitars and amps and our setups !! No high tech just over 100 years of experience messing with guitars !!
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
We have made it thru covid, and just slow seasons, without a lot of money and we have survived after falling victim to these Merchant Cash Advance predatory lenders. If I had it all to do over again I would raise as much money as I could before I opened! Figure 3x as much as you think you will ever need and you will be close !!
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
The old saying you can build a business without money is wrong ! Plain and simple maybe a total service business but not retail! And I wish I listened to other peoples advise more clearly however to do this or any business it takes faith and committment! Do not waste your time adding folks to your business that are not committed to what you are trying to do ! It will hurt more when you have to let them go !
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.atlantavintageguitars.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/atlantavintageguitars/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AtlantaVintageGuitars/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@AtlantaVintageGtrs
