Vinyl lovers can soon find Arrow’s Aim Records at a new location with triple the inventory.
The indie record store, located at the corner of Northwest First Avenue, will set up shop in two weeks at 10 N. Main St., where the F.L.A. Gallery used to be.
More than 20,000 records will be on sale starting Oct. 15. The extra space will allow albums to be broken down by more specific genres, simplifying record hunting.
“Making it a more comfortable and fulfilling shopping experience is kind of the point of expanding,” said Daniel Halal, the store’s owner. “Once we move, everything will be out. It’ll be really easy to find stuff, making it a better experience overall.”
Halal, a 29-year-old Gainesville resident, said the store has been rising in popularity since it opened in September 2012.
“We just didn’t really know how much of a demand there was, so we decided to start small and expand if we needed to,” Halal said. “And it just really took off a lot better than we ever thought it would, so it’s time to expand.”
The new location will preserve the small shop’s retro charm with an all-white, 20-foot ceiling lined with records, Halal said.
“I think the fact that they’re expanding shows how records are definitely coming back,” said Annaleigh Bonds, a 20-year-old UF public relations junior.
Bonds said she has been collecting records since high school and looks forward to the new location.
“I almost think that the store’s expansion is going to speed up that trend in Gainesville because the more people who go into a record store, the more they want records,” she said.
Halal said he will start packing up the current shop next week.
“I think what I’m interested in is cultivating the culture and environment of record buying in Gainesville and making that better,” he said. “It’s going to be a whole new store.”
[A version of this story ran on page 3 on 10/3/2014]
