We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful James Jones. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with James below.
Hi James, thanks for joining us today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?
Our mission if we have one is to promote underground music. The music that might not be heard otherwise is what we are interested in putting out on our label or selling in the shop. That’s not to say we don’t sell popular music as well. Music has a very amazing history and rotten princess is interested in most aspects of that.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
Collecting music has been an obsession of mine since I was very young. Learning about the music I love has always been a hobby of mine as well. Be it from biographical music books ,zines,magazines etc.etc. I want to learn about what I love. I have lots of friends who are great musicians and through them I realized I too wanted to make some noise. A group of my friends had been playing together for a while when we were sixteen and decided I would be a good singer. I was not a good singer but I had fun being creative with the medium. I always had a lot of energy on stage. That band was called the professional liars and I haven’t stopped since. It’s been 27 years of making punk rock and I think I kinda almost have the hang of it now. I run rotten princess the record label with the guitar player from that band. I would like to think Dan and I carry on the same spark and vision we had as kids. In July of 2021 we opened our store Rotten Princess Records East. It is located in grayling mi. We sell new and used vinyl of all types. We do special orders. We host free all ages shows. We also sell skateboards, cassettes, cd’s, record players.,clothing, and lots of other things. Our label puts out records, tapes, and cd’s of music that we find interesting. ….check us out at rottenprincessrecords.bandcamp.com
Where do you think you get most of your clients from?
So far I think my biggest source for new clients has been word of mouth. I always try to give everyone a great experience every time they are here. Often i hear something to the effect of my friend told me I had to check this place out from new customers. I am always willing to wheel and deal with prices and as a record collector myself I know that is something customers enjoy. I try to be as fair as I can when buying or trading records with people . Also although I am not the biggest fan of the internet or social media I still use it to its full potential when it comes to the business. It’s important that people can figure out what you are up to. Having a presence on the internet is very important to the success of a business in this day and age.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
From 2011 to 2016 I ran a different record store/label. It was called trustfall records and coffee. We had so many good times but never made any profit. I made many mistakes but I learned from them. Although it completely broke my heart I made the decision to close in 2016. We were closing in on 5 years of business and I didn’t see any change coming anytime soon. For five years I planned and schemed on how to do it again but better this time. In 2017 I started helping my friend Dan with his label rotten princess records. Soon it became our label . We have at this point 126 releases on our label and our fan base is growing every day. In 2021 I decided to open the shop. Since Dan had been jokingly referring to me as rotten princess records east for awhile I asked him what he thought about me using that for the new stores name. He agreed and here we are.
