Local record shop holding ‘Records and Rugs’ sale

Published 11:04 am Friday, February 8, 2019

Record fans who love a good bargain, or the thrill of bargain hunting, are in luck this weekend. Oxford’s independent record store The End of All Music is holding their first Records and Rugs event at Southside Gallery on the Square on Saturday.

It is a combination of $1 records, rugs and even art that will be on display. The idea was a simple one for End of All Music owner David Swider and his wife, Virginia, who sells Persian and Turkish vintage rugs.

With a massive overstock of records sitting in their garage, the idea of doing a bargain sale seemed a practical way of clearing space and allowing people to look for some records they might not have expected to find a reasonable price.

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“(Virginia) supplied the rugs for the record store and we were trying to find a way to kind of a rug sale in town,” David said. “I was like ‘well, we’ve got all these dollar records, let’s try to find a venue where we can sell both. You can’t really do both (in the record shop).”

In need of a space big enough to accommodate vintage rugs and a large quantity of records the Swiders contacted Southside Gallery. The gallery was excited about the idea and they quickly set up a date and time.

The creation of this first-ever event was thought of less than a month ago. With the Oxford Film Festival also taking place, this weekend felt like the perfect window of holding it.

The rugs run from miniature in size (2×3 feet) to full size (9×12 feet) will also be on display for purchase throughout the gallery. This is the second time Virginia has done a physical sale of her rugs. The first sale was two weeks ago in New Orleans, which she noted went ‘really well.’ Virginia does most of her sales through her Instagram account @shopalexine.

The idea of the record sale aspect is to make it a completely different from the shopping experience people get when they go into End of All Music.

“Every time I buy a large record collection I’m really picking at what goes (in the shop),” David said. “Our record store is not really a record store where you can go to typically dig for things. It’s very well organized already and the records are all clean. So, this is kind of an opportunity for people to get dirty and look through a bunch of records and get deals.”

With such a large stock of records David is going to allow ‘some deals to be made’. The more records people buy the better the deal they might be able to negotiate. It is also a perfect opportunity for someone who is just starting their record collection to build up their library without breaking the bank.

The event will run from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at Southside Gallery on Saturday and feature DJs throughout the day playing music. The sale could run over into Sunday depending on how Saturday goes. The record store will also be open at its Square location during regular hours on Saturday.