Located at 1120 N. Ashland Ave. in Chicago, Dusty Groove America is one of the nation’s top independent record stores. What started with “a few college DJs at WHPK, 88.5 FM on the south side of Chicago” is now a vinyl mecca with an up-to-the-minute online store, specializing in hard-to-find reissues. In a recent Q&A for ALARM, owner Rick Wojcik answered a few questions and selected a few of Dusty Groove’s top CD reissues (pictured below).
Which albums has your store sold the most over the past month?
It’s not like we have any real “hits,” since we don’t sell much contemporary music, like indie rock, which would make it easier to talk about in terms of big records that have defined a season. Every day we add hundreds of different new titles to the racks, usually just one copy at a time, so we’re less likely to have this sort of focus than other stores.
Why do people choose your store over major or Internet retailers?
I think we’ve got very good prices and impeccable service — even in comparison to the bigger online retailers. But from the start, we’ve known that we’ve had to match the level of businesses like Amazon, or we’d never survive.
You have a drive-through window! Tell me about that.
Well, we don’t really have a drive-through window — it’s more of a walk-up window, with a parking space nearby — but it’s been closed for a number of years now. You see, we started as an online business, and we were only open a few days a week to the public — so in the past, this was a feature that would allow customers to order online and then drive to the store to pick up an order when we were closed.
But now we’re conveniently open from 10 AM to 8 PM every day of the week — so customers who order online just pick up the order in the store instead.
I read that you personally listen to every disc you offer. You also write reviews for new material on your site. Does that enable a personal relationship between you and your customers?
Well, yes, it’s me and another guy here — but I still try to listen to just about everything we sell. I’m not sure if that creates a better relationship between me and our customers — because, I think, everyone’s got their own unique tastes — and it’s hard to say that just listening to a record creates a bond with the customers. That, instead, really comes just from listening to what they want, taking their requests seriously, and trying to share their enthusiasm for the music that motivates them to buy records and CDs. But we’re all pretty enthusiastic about music here ourselves, so that makes for an easy fit.
What was your motivation for starting a music store? / What is your background in music?
Dusty Groove grew out of the efforts of a few college DJs at WHPK, 88.5fm on the south side of Chicago. We were DJs and huge record collectors — and we started the store both as a way of providing the same sort of musical connection we got as DJs, and as a way to help sell some of the great records we were finding in our trips around the country, and around the world.
What is the musical community like in your area?
We’re in Chicago, so we’re lucky to have one of the most diverse — and most interesting — musical scenes in the world. We love the city for its heritage of classic jazz and soul — our big specialty at Dusty Groove — but we also really appreciate all the unique hybrids that have cropped up in the city over the years, the sharing of ideas that have grown out of the blues scene, house clubs, free-jazz sets, indie-rock venues, and even the important recording studios that have really helped shape the sound of Chicago over the years.
What makes your store unique?
We started online first — as an online-only retailer, then added a store later — when our customers online started expecting there to be a physical store named Dusty Groove! The process was slow — at first we were open one day a month, then just on the weekends, then eventually 7 days a week — and we continue to maintain a very strong online presence, and mix that energy with the store as well. Everything in the store is always online at www.dustygroove.com — and many of our local customers shop online first, then come into the store to pick up their order.
How do you support independent musicians?
We’ve forged strong relationships with a number of local musicians — and have not only continued to buy their music outright, putting cash right back in their pockets so they can keep on affording to create — but also have even helped some local artists press up titles, forwarding them the money, just because we believe in their music and want to be able to offer it to our customers.
Do you promote zines or visual art?
We’re not a rock store, so there’s not many zines in our neck of the wood, but we do really support a lot of independent magazines, including ALARM. And as for visual art, we rent out our top floor to an important gallery — Corbett vs. Dempsey — and also allow them to exhibit visual art in our store.
Currently, what are some of your favorite albums? Your least favorite / most overrated?
Man, that’s really tough to say — impossible, actually. We’re always hearing something new, and great, every single day — so I’m not sure we could easily come up with any sort of favorites. That’s the best part of our job — always getting turned onto great new music!