We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Wade Ogle. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Wade below.

Wade, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

I came up in the local punk/DIY scene in the late 80’s. I played music, toured as well as booked and promoted shows for other artists. in ’93, I began working at a beloved local college bar. In the late 90’s, I started booking all the shows and, in 2000, became a part-owner. All in, I was in that business for twenty years. Near the time that I felt I was aging out and needed to find something new to do, the space next to the venue became available. That was in 2014. Fortuitous timing for me. Irionically, the new space was the former home of a record store that had sort of devolved into a “head shop”. I leased the space, gutted it and set about creating a proper record store. I’ve collected/purchased records since I was eight years old. I’ve been to countless record stores over the years. I have pretty strong ideas about what makes for a great record store…as well as what makes for a bad one. Being able to reduce what I do purely to music, without the trappings of night life and the bar business, was a bit of a dream come true. I’m grateful everything sort of lead in that direction…eventually.

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

I’m Wade Ogle, owner of Block Street Records (Fayetteville and Bentonville, AR). We’re an independent, locally owned retail recotrd store. We specialize in new, vintage and rare records as well as CDs, cassettes, turntables, speakers, hi-fi gear, posters, t-shirts, pop culture memorabilia and more. Our sales are almost 100% exclusively in-store (plus mail order). Our main store has been here eleven years (2nd store = 7 years). I’m proud that we’ve become a well loved staple of the community with a customer base that’s truly all-ages, all kinds. We try hard to make it a welcoming, enjoyable and memorable experience.

Have you ever had to pivot?

As I mentioned previously, I was in the nightclub/bar/live music venue business for twenty years. Plus, all the years playing live music. Great fun and lots of exciting memories. But, after 20+ years, it kind of became the trap you wanted to chew your own arm off to escape. But, I was married, had children, a home etc. And, I was newly 5o. The notion of doing something new, from scratch, was a bit terrifying. But, I also felt everything I’d done had sort of lead up to that moment. A lifetime of formerly useless information (music history etc) that would now serve me well. I was really determined to make it work. My dream was that I could work hard and, hopefully, make a modest living. Knock on wood, it all sort of timed out exactly with the “vinyl renaissance”. Pure serendipity. I feel extremely fortunate that it’s worked out and we’re super diligent about making it the best record store it can be. 100% would do it again. Wish I’d done it sooner.

Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?

Our staff, for two stores, is seven people total. That includes myself. My “main guy” has been here eight years. Others have been here 3-4 years. We have very slow, minimal turnover. Typically, only when someone has a big life change. With a record store, between new releases and used collections, there’s a near constant stream of fresh things to be excited about. So, if you love records and music, it’s a pretty happy place to be. I think everyone sees how much it all means to be and the efforts I put in to make it the best it can be, and they follow suit because they want it to be awesome as well. We work hard, but everyone is also really funny, cool and kind. It’s all much closer to a work family than a sterile job enviroment.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/blockstreetrecords
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/blockstreetrecords

Image Credits

All photos = Wade Ogle.