Festive Opening

Challenges continue to come thick and fast

As soon as Woodseats was open and operating as a functional store I once again had to leave Coops and Doug alone for two thirds of the week in order to sort out the old store. This was made more odious when I learned that we had to rip out the structures we’d built. And this needed to be done quite quickly because we were continuing to pay rent and needed to hand the premises back to the two landlords whose property our old store straddled.

The following month was probably the hardest of my life. Myself and a couple of labourers shifted 9 skips full of breeze, rubble and old “stuff” that had been accumulated over 26 years. We ripped up carpets, broke down old display furniture, swept, hoovered and cleaned and then bricked up the gap between the two sections. Rockwool was swallowed.

On the last day my dad joined me and we finally said goodbye to 184 Fitzwilliam Street, locking the doors for the last time and posting them through our landlord's door. I shed more than a few tears I’m not ashamed to admit. It was some consolation that my dad was with me, because he’d been with me when we opened the store. 

Closing any shop that you’ve poured years of your life into is extremely traumatic. Even if it is tinged with the success of a new venture it still feels like failure. I left feeling ten years older and looking like five miles of bad road.

Woodeats becomes established

I really needn’t have worried. Just as customers helped us move, they helped us by remaining loyal and visiting us for all their hi-fi needs. And even old customers who we hadn’t seen for a while seemed to be back visiting us in Woodseats.

Earlier in this history I covered my experiences with the hi-fi press. Their popularity had declined dramatically in the ensuing years. Eventually sales were so poor that the top sellers lost their position in the top 100 magazines and as a result lost their place in many stores and supermarkets and this pushed circulation off a cliff.

Ten years before (give or take) we took the decision to stop advertising in the hi-fi press. This was informed by three factors. 

One was their continued endless recommendation of Richer Sounds. I have no beef with Richer but an “independent” magazine continuing to give 5 star reviews to their own brands (Cambridge and others) was disingenuous and did independent shops no good at all. It was “bought” and paid for by large advertising spend. I repeat I don’t blame Richer but I do blame the magazines.

Two was the aforementioned poor circulation and the diversification to include phones and other tech that we felt was less relevant to us.

Three; the fact that the adverts were expensive and gave us little benefit. My reasoning was that if customers were interested in hi-fi they would google search hifi shops and ours would come up. They would make their way to our website and hopefully by one means or another to us. So we’d invested in our website and all our forward facing social media instead.

Almost immediately we found that this was working. In simple terms it drove in customers and sales. So we upped the posts, the discussions, the pictures and the information. We got involved in Facebook in 2010 and felt fairly at home there. Personally I felt confident using it and grew confident in posting. I’ve never felt the same way about Twitter and Insta and I won’t use Tik Tok or any of that nonsense because I don’t understand it and I don’t particularly know what we’d be expected to say. I don’t feel as if I have confidence in my voice there.

I got into the habit of posting regularly and used Facebook to keep people informed about what we were up to, events, new products, special offers and traded in equipment. And we decided to up the events after taking a break from them towards the end of Fitzwilliam Street.

We’d taken a break because we felt the events weren’t working that well. We’d also got pretty demoralised by the situation with the substance abuse clinic and the increase in antisocial behaviour. I think we took a break because we all wanted one.

On Woodseats myself and the staff had a shorter commute, our own parking and we weren’t facing the endless bollocks of scumbags thieving and beating each other bloody. Moods improved dramatically and so did positivity. With positivity comes progress and we thought it would be a good idea if we started the manufacturer open days again.

We were mostly seeing the same faces and it is true to say those customers were already fairly regular visitors. However it did enable us to catch up and it did allow people to meet and chat with other like minded people and that’s something we felt should not be overlooked. Each event would also call forth a few new customers or get some old customers back in to re-engage. The events drive a spike in business that follows them. We rarely try to sell on the day but the boost in business sometimes takes a while but then lasts a while.

You may be interested in knowing that we’ve long wanted to arrange our own hi-fi show. The only reason this has not taken place is because of our failure to find a suitable venue. And when we have they’ve not been interested in working with us. Most seem content with wedding and craft fayres. We will keep looking.

In many ways the move to Woodseats saved the company. I don’t think we’d have lasted on Fitzwilliam Street for many more years and it would have been the death of a thousand cuts. It also saved my sanity and put me in a place where I had a better grip and understanding of what the business needed to move forward. And of course I can’t underestimate the importance of good staff and the loyalty of our customers.

Our Facebook group

Dad had always realised that we appealed to a small percentage of the population. With this in mind the idea of community was always in our minds. We noted that customers liked to meet when they visited us and they enjoyed chatting about their systems. We’d seen the rise of independent hi-fi shows and Bake-offs where people would meet and enjoy listening and comparing their equipment. We were also seeing people talking in response to our posts on Facebook.

Personally I was involved in some Facebook groups and these were music related. I’d seen the massive potential for people to interact in these groups, sometimes even forming friendships and meeting up in person. This gave me the idea to start a Moorgate group.

I did this in 2019 (I think) and quickly gathered a few regular customers as members. I had been spending a lot of time on other music and hi-fi related groups and to me they were mostly (but not all) absolutely terrible places full of idiotic comment, zealotry, one-upmanship and often bullying. Invariably I’d join and hover for a while, usually biting my tongue and blinking a lot in disbelief. Then I’d possibly comment and then I’d await a reaction which could be scorn, disbelief and disapproval or even anger. Then I’d think “fuck this for a game of soldiers and leave”. People would frequently add me to groups thinking I’d be interested. I almost immediately left.

My time in BADA and Mountain Snow (an initially successful but later ill fated buying group) had made me realise I don’t like groups or clubs. The reason I don’t like them is because the members all say one thing and do another. I have likened this to herding cats. Cats like doing what they want and people tend to be the same. I have no problem with this at all except I was starting a group and I wanted to ensure we didn’t just repeat the same problems I’d found elsewhere.

I never wanted to impose my own ideas on the group. Covid taught me that I am a libertarian and I believe in minimum interference by outside bodies into my life and business. So the last thing I wanted to do was to tell people what to do. I can advise people what to do but I’m not going to tell them what to do. There lies the difference.

Anyway when the group was small we set out some rules. These were extremely simple and based on not being rude, being friendly, recognising that your opinion is just that and no more and for is all to try and keep everything about music first.

Things went well and people were invited to join and slowly the group grew and expanded and now has over 1400 members. This surprises me but in a good way and I am delighted with it. I am even more delighted with the inherent decency and good-naturedness of almost all our members. And anyone who falls outside this is ejected after one warning. 

A few like minded souls were approached to work as admins on the group. Their efforts and work means I can be away from my computer and return to find things orderly and polite. Which really is a joy to me. I’ve always been surprised that my staff don’t get more involved in the group but there’s no mileage in me forcing anyone to do anything they don’t want, especially out of hours. 

The group is a joy to me because it has become a community and a community of people who have a fairly obscure hobby. Here they can seek second opinions, share and get good advice. Most people I speak to admit that they do not know many people who share the same enthusiasm for music or good sound. So finding a group of 1400 similarly minded souls is a joy to them.

If you’re reading this and you’re not a member but think that you might like to discover more then do consider joining us. It is a very welcoming place.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/Moorgate

We’ve kept the group about music first. Hi-Fi being a means to better appreciate it. This is our ethos in everything we do. It is a great testament to the members that the group is and remains (and will remain) a friendly place.

Wax@Moorgate

Moorgate is on three levels at Woodseats and the basement was selected to be our stockroom. However a combination of damp and the wettest year in my memory meant that we took the decision to move the stock up to the top floor. The final straw was the discovery of an emaciated frog down there. We moved him to a nearby cemetery and left him to good fortune with at least a fighting chance of a meal.

This left us with some space that wasn’t really usable. After discussions with our landlord we decided to call in some experts to see what could be done to make the basement usable as it was costing us to rent. We got quotes for tanking after taking advice that it was the only solution. Eventually we settled on a local firm who were the only ones offering common sense. Since the water was somehow getting into the premises to the left of the building; they sensibly suggested tanking that half of the basement. This should and did solve the problem and at 50% of the cost. This is why you can see a step where the counter is located.

The only downside is that good firms are busy and so they worked in between other jobs and this took a little longer than we’d hoped. It did however solve our problem and left us with a usable and dry area. One of my ambitions had always been to open a record store and the timing and the space and the fact that we were already paying rent for it gave us a perfect opportunity. We were also firmly convinced that the vinyl revolution would continue and that a record store would go hand in hand with Moorgate Acoustics.

I’ll admit to knowing nothing about record stores. I knew what I liked and I had an idea what sort of music we’d like to sell. A good friend of mine did a lot of research and came up with the design and look of the store as well as many other excellent ideas. She joined me in being a driving force in the final opening of Wax 5 years ago and works as manager to this day.

We opened with a selection of new and used LP’s and a selection of used CD’s. And we hit a steep learning curve which meant a lot of hard work, a lot of stepping outside comfort zones and a massive learning curve. Running a business is a constant learning curve to be honest as I am sure many of you know.

In the fairly short period of time before covid arrived on the landscape, we could see that Wax would be an asset to us. Initially it drew from our existing customers but soon it attracted its own and in time, some of them began to find their way upstairs. We also felt that we had something of a unique proposition and that it would draw people to perhaps travel a little further to visit us and indulge their passion for music and hi-fi.

Take a tour of the original Wax here;

https://www.facebook.com/reel/861265120914689

And it seemed to be working.

Which leads me to Covid

I could see from the frantic reporting in the early days of Covid that it was going to have a great impact on all our lives. I think we still don’t appreciate how big that impact would be, how much we lost and how heavy the cost would be.

Let me say right now that I don’t trust governments and I don’t trust massive organisations who tell the governments (they call it advising) what to do. They’re all clubs and clubs are full of self-serving people who want to fill their beaks. I mean this non politically and I’m not waving any flag other than that of Moorgate Acoustics. 

When I heard the word Lockdowns mentioned I felt sure that at some point they’d come. They were being mentioned all the time and it was clear we were being prepared for them. They terrified me for many different reasons. Some were personal but most of them related to the way they might impact and possibly even destroy dads company. 

When lockdowns arrived I knew this was a defining moment for us in some way. I knew that we had to remain open in whatever way that we could so that we could continue to engage with our customers. I could not imagine sitting at home and doing this. I can’t work from home. I don’t know how other people can. Far too many distractions. In any event you can’t retail remotely.

We found that we could “covid secure” the premises by hanging some signs up. Not sure who would ever see them because we were not allowed to let customers in. However we could see them and we cleaned when we should and kept to separate sides of the shop. Doug at one end and me at the other. Coops we furloughed because his dad was vulnerable and we were concerned about shielding.

During this time we opened 3-4 days a week and we answered the phone, answered our emails and engaged with our customers on the Moorgate Acoustics Facebook page and more importantly the Facebook Group.

We learned that customers were allowed to collect items from us provided we took precautions. We had to put items in the customers boot, or deliver items onto customers drives. We had to wear masks and gloves and observe social distancing. Scotch eggs were not involved.

We quickly found that the phone never stopped ringing and we received more emails than we were used to. People were also engaging us online and they wanted to buy things. They were off work, they were being paid and they were bored.
I think it is also fair to say that there was a strange dystopian feel to life during this period. There was a lot of worry and there was a lot of fear but married to this was a sort of absurdity with regards to the rules. Rules relating to outside exercise and things like this were also at best strange and at worst comical. All this meant that for people like you and I, music became even more important than ever before. It was the thing that kept us sane.

Business during this period was off the scale good and I think in part this was because a lot of stores closed. Not all but many of them did. We’d get a lot of phone calls that started with “hey!!!! You’re open! I need some equipment”.

A few notable instances arose out of such calls. One customer ordered £30,000 worth of equipment over the phone on the condition that we’d deliver it within a couple of days. He’d been meaning to do it for years but finally had the time. Not all our suppliers were open so we would often have to use our demo stock. Customers didn’t care just so long as they got music at home.

We received fortuitous calls from Rega and PMC. They offered us stock that was sitting in their store rooms and directed customers to us. Within one 5 week period we shifted 159 Rega turntables. They arrived in two drops and filled our entire showroom. PMC was similar but not in such numbers.

The relief was immense when I realised that we might actually survive this virus as a business.

During the 1st lockdown my parents were both diagnosed with Alzheimers. It had been evident for a while that both of them were having memory problems but getting further along with regard to a verdict was taking a long time. In the end I got the diagnosis only because I had more time to chase the NHS to finally provide one based on the tests they’d been doing prior. I had to spend a lot of time with them in order to offer reassurance. Neither mum or dad understood what was going on in the wider world and they’d forget what they were told. This added a lot to my stress levels but none of this was quite so bad when I realised that the business would be ok.

Eventually Paul Cooper returned to work and Doug took a break. We were not sure that we could justify all three of us working in fairly close quarters and I think Doug was ready for a rest. Coops was going stir crazy and was relieved to get out of the house and do something that could provide a distraction.

It remained an exceptionally busy time, as did all the lockdowns and again I thank our loyal customers for this. I also think we came to the attention of a lot of new customers. And the Facebook group went from strength to strength and enabled us to share more and more with our members. The group grew at this time as well.

I feel some guilt to report how we did during covid because it was a terrible time for a lot of people and the country still has not fully recovered from it. It might be years before we do.

By the time the lockdowns ended it had become clear that nobody really knew what they were doing. The advice was conflicting and the powers that be clearly weren’t taking a great deal of notice of the rules. However by the time we were allowed to open our doors again and receive customers we were thrilled to bits to be able to do so.

Initially customers were wary. The mask thing had an effect on some more than others. Some were glad to take them off and some were frightened to do so. We took our lead from the customer and wore masks when it became evident that the customers were more comfortable. When the mask mandate was removed I was the happiest I’d been in a long time.

When we did re-open the store was half empty due to the fact that we’d sold off half our stock. It took us a while to replace it as well because there were massive parts shortages that affected a lot of our brands.

Another covid plus was having a little time allowed me to start building LP12’s out of the parts we’d accumulated over the thirty eight or so years we’d been working on them. My fourth working day was spent building them. As I built them they’d sell and so I’d build more. We also did a lot of upgrade work on Sondeks over the lockdowns and upgrades mean more trade in parts and more Sondeks.

All of these “stories” and activities provided Facebook posts to interested customers and plenty of discussion on the group. During covid the group seemed like one of my better ideas and it had a momentum which continues to this day. A lot of work but a lot of reward.

Thank you for reading. The final chapter will bring us up to date and also look at what the future might look like for Moorgate Acoustics.