Pittsburgh vinyl shop that opened in 1980 and almost closed in 2000 is booming again thanks to music fans and now sells $1.5M of albums a year

A Pittsburgh record store that was on the verge of closing in 2000 is now thriving again thanks to a vinyl revival.

First opened in 1980, the Attic Record Store has survived recessions, streaming and even acts of God to become one of the few independent record stores in the area.

The beloved store now generates around $1.5 million a year in album sales, with young and old flocking to its shelves every day.

What’s most surprising is that while many record stores have embraced online ordering, owner Fred Bohn Jr. has broken the trend with a more analogue approach.

“We don’t sell anything online,” he told the newspaper Wall Street Journal. ‘If you sell all your nicest stuff on the internet, it’s not as fun for people to come to the store.’

The only exception to this are customers from abroad. Bohn often takes telephone requests from record collectors as far away as Japan and Europe.

The scenes are very different from those of twenty years ago, when Bohn seriously considered closing his store amid poor sales.

The then thirty-year-old had taken over the store from his father, who had earned a living by competing with major record store chains.

Just as the market was moving closer to CDs and eventually digital streaming, Bohn suffered another blow in 2004 when much of its stock was destroyed by a catastrophic flood.

But luckily, he decided to try to weather the storm and saw that his efforts paid off.

“We have absolutely no trouble paying the bills,” he added, but admitted that most of his earnings are immediately reinvested into buying more shares.

Last year, Bohn earned $29,000 for a collection of 1,000 records.

The vinyl is stored on the 4,000-square-foot factory floor, as well as in maze-like back rooms.

Attic Records is so dense that it would take an estimated 16 days to go through all the titles.

“The great thing about records is that there is never too much,” Bohn explained.

The business owner does not have an exact number for his inventory or daily sales, but prefers to run his business in a more intuitive style.

It’s an approach that has paid off, if the TikTok videos in which fans travel from all over the country to visit the store are to be believed.

Most of the store’s inventory sells for between $5 and $30, although rarer entries kept off the store floor can sell for more than $500.

“The rare records are selling the fastest,” Bohn explained, though he added that some of his biggest sellers are more modern and mainstream, like Phoebe Bridgers, Noah Kahan and, of course, Taylor Swift.

“Now we literally get six-year-olds buying Taylor Swift records with their parents,” Bohn said.

Attic Record Store’s resilience is a testament not only to the passion of vinyl fans, but also to the benefits of waiting for trends and fads.

According to the Recording Industry Association of America, about 43 million records were sold last year.

Vinyl sales surpassed those of CDs by more than six million, the second time since 1987.

The figures match an increase in record sales over the past 17 years.

Record Store Day, first conceived in 2007 to ‘celebrate the culture of the independent record store’, is now a thriving annual affair, with special releases and performances.

What was once dismissed as hoarding has turned into a lucrative strategy for Bohn, who stays on top of music trends by talking to his customers.

This personal approach has helped him through, as evidenced by a recent Instagram post recognizing his success.

‘Thank you for over 40 years of making friends and playing records!’ Bohn wrote.