50 Years Ago Today! March 7, 1970!

[marv2]

Cunninghams Drug Store and Rexall Drug Store! [[Wiki has a nice history of the chains). Neither carried records though.

Now you've done it! I so remember Cunninghams 21drug stores and my neighborhood drug store growing up was Rexall's! I even knew the pharmacist by name, he was Larryl LOL! No they did't sell records. I do remember a popular record store on the East side of Detroit, Famous Coachman's Record Store.

[detmotownguy]

Shays House of Music in Melvidale/Allen Park always carried a lot of Motown/R&B. He was great guy.

[marv2]

Shays House of Music in Melvidale/Allen Park always carried a lot of Motown/R&B. He was great guy.

That's one I wasn't familiar with. Strange as much as I have been to Allen Park. There was Kendricks records in the city. Another one on Linwood that I can't remember the name of now, but I think it was owned by Donnie Simpson's family. Donnie "The Luv Bug" from radio and from Video Soul on BET.

[detmotownguy]

He would display the new albums on the walls so that the record buyer knew immediately what artist had a new release out. He was very personable and could spend hours talking to him about various artists.

[marv2]

He would display the new albums on the walls so that the record buyer knew immediately what artist had a new release out. He was very personable and could spend hours talking to him about various artists.

Then the malls became popular and the big box record stores like Peaches, Coconuts,Tower etc, etc. At the mall you'd find Camelot, The Wiz, Record Town, Sam Goody, Strawberries Music etc. It was never the same when those places opened up.

[JohnnyB]

Then the malls became popular and the big box record stores like Peaches, Coconuts,Tower etc, etc. At the mall you'd find Camelot, The Wiz, Record Town, Sam Goody, Strawberries Music etc. It was never the same when those places opened up.

Cunningham’s, Crowley’s, Kresge, this thread has brought back so many Detroit memories. My favorites came a little later; does anyone remember The Detroit Audio System and Bad Records?

[marv2]

Cunningham’s, Crowley’s, Kresge, this thread has brought back so many Detroit memories. My favorites came a little later; does anyone remember The Detroit Audio System and Bad Records?

I remember Detroit Audio Systems ads and commercials.

[milven]

Then the malls became popular and the big box record stores like Peaches, Coconuts,Tower etc, etc. At the mall you'd find Camelot, The Wiz, Record Town, Sam Goody, Strawberries Music etc. It was never the same when those places opened up.

And Crazy Eddie and Disco Mat and others that got big too fast, over extended themselves with credit and then shriveled up and disappeared. They never really were competition to the efficiently run little record store where everyone knew your name and when the person behind the counter was the human equivalent of Shazam. The big box stores could never compete with that. And their "sales" were fake too. They had a limited amount of sale product, so if someone really wanted to get their music the day it dropped, after being burned once or twice by the big box stores by wasting gas money to get there only to find out that they were out of it; they came back to their little mama papa store. As a kid, my best times was time spent in one of these stores. And when those big box stores kept on expanding only to eventually fail and go out of business, we used to smile and sing ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST.

Of course, eventually, downloading and digital music also made the little store extinct, but none of them will be forgotten. I am sure that all of us have fond memories of our favorite little store.

The big box store was never the competition of the little store.

There was a little store in NYC that had everything. It was called King Karol. Paraphrasing , there motto was "What competition? We are the competition"

And we used to test the knowledge of the salespeople in King Karol. Once we asked a clerk if he had any albums by Sonja Henie , an ice skater who also appeared in movies. He recommended a soundtrack and said "If you listen carefully, you can hear her skating in the background". Can't get that kind of feedback in a big box store.

[marv2]

"Up the Ladder to the Roof" got a lot of radio airplay in early 1970. Locally, some DJ's flipped it over and started playing "Bill, When Are You Coming Back" after a number of weeks.