When Village Green Records customers couldn’t go inside, they went online.
A sanctuary to thousands of records, cassette tapes, and CDs, Village Green Records (VGR) continues to offer a unique shopping experience to customers during the pandemic.
Ball State alumnus Travis Harvey opened the shop 15 years ago, feeling the Muncie community needed a record store.
“It [Muncie] needs something that has sort of a sincere cultural hub to it,” Harvey says.
VGR started small with only one section of vinyls and CDs, then expanded over time to what Travis calls “a home.”
“It essentially started as the living room, and then it became the living and dining room, and family room,” Harvey says. “Then it became a bedroom, so the record store slowly took over.”
Like many small business owners, Travis’ mission of giving customers the genuine VGR experience of hand-picked music was interrupted by COVID-19. Stores that did not sell essential items like groceries, medicine, and equipment for transportation were forced to operate by curbside pickup or call-in orders due to Executive Order 20-22, passed by the state of Indiana on April 7, 2020.
VGR was forced to embark on a new path for selling music. Travis credits his partner Sarah Ponto Rivera as being the catalyst behind their solution to the store’s new reality.
Rivera suggested VGR should use Patreon, a website where users can subscribe at different levels and receive incentives accordingly.
“She was thinking it would be the best way to allow people to have the VGR experience of new handpicked music without being able to come into the store,” Travis says.
Travis set up their Patreon website in March before Indiana required all non-essential retail stores to close in-store operations. On their Patreon website, VGR offers nine levels, with level one costing only $5, and level nine costing $300.
Entitled, “Tip Your Local Record Store,” the level one bundle is a simple way subscribers could help support VGR.
The level nine bundle, named “Hampton’s Horde,” offers users five used or new albums in their package, with the consumer’s choice between vinyls, CD’s, or cassette tapes. They also receive a VGR Horde shirt.
Since starting in March, the VGR Patreon program has shipped 1,800 vinyls, CDs, and cassette tapes all across the country. Travis says people have attempted to join the program in other countries, too.
Logan Goff, a customer of Village Green Records since 2009, is currently subscribed to the fourth level, or the “33 ⅓ Crew,” of the Patreon program. In this bundle, subscribers receive a monthly package of new and used albums in either record, CD, or cassette form.
“It’s like getting little gifts in the mail every month,” Goff says. “There is a human element to it that I think is unique from other box-in-the-mail subscriptions, which is likely due to the scale of it. Even though it’s a surprise each month, I feel like I always get what I sign up for.”
Travis says VGR has been averaging 90 members per month, with the total amount earned from the program being equivalent to the total sales of two good Saturdays. Because Patreon takes out 8 to 12% of the profit to provide Travis with the service, he is currently looking at additional platforms to use.
“That’s a fairly substantial chunk that hinders my ability to build the best bundles for our members,” Travis says.
To support Travis and VGR, you can check out the Patreon website.
