Owner Aiden Lynch talks about his pop culture collectibles stall and associated online business
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🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00 on so many occasions people walk past and they're like
00:03 "Oh my god I haven't been into the market in so many years"
00:05 "How long have you been here?"
00:07 We do get a lot of people shocked
00:10 a lot of people still come here expecting to see the old shops here as well
00:14 looking for the plates and dishes
00:16 and they're like "No, we've been here a fair while now"
00:19 You do get a fair amount of surprise and
00:21 like "Oh wow"
00:22 and it's good as well because
00:24 it gives people a reason to come in as well, they're sort of like
00:28 happy that this sort of stuff's here
00:30 July is Independent Retailer Month
00:32 and we've been speaking to some of the business owners
00:34 at Jackie White's Market in Sunderland
00:36 Here's a look at one of the stalls there, the Retro Room
00:39 Opened in 2022, May
00:43 We sort of made a conscious decision to open on May 4th
00:49 so we'd have the Star Wars day
00:51 We originally opened in the back in a smaller unit
00:53 and there was a little bit of success
00:56 so we moved to this unit
00:58 A good base of our customers is returning customers
01:00 actually we've been pretty lucky
01:02 we've picked up some really good customers
01:04 and we've been lucky with the other businesses in the area as well
01:07 they've been sending us some really great customers
01:10 so we do get a lot of repeat customers
01:13 but finding new customers is probably the most difficult part
01:17 because a lot of people just don't venture into the market
01:20 so we have been getting a good turnover of new customers
01:26 but returning customers
01:28 and people who know us through online as well
01:30 is another key element of what brings people in
01:33 Online has become a massive part of what we do
01:36 Initially when we set this up
01:39 I set it up with the intention of treating this as a base
01:42 and a way of bringing stock into
01:46 what was an already existing online venture
01:52 we were doing a lot via ebay, a lot via facebook marketplace
01:56 and I just wanted to have a physical space
01:59 so a lot of what we've done is
02:02 focused on just having this as a physical
02:06 and reliant on the online
02:08 but now it's turning a little bit
02:10 where we're doing pretty good in here
02:12 and we want to bring it all together into one big thing
02:16 and we're just opening the new website as well this week
02:20 so that will be theretroroomsunderland.com
02:26 I don't think markets in general get enough recognition
02:29 every town I've ever been to with a market
02:32 I've always gravitated towards it
02:34 I've always gone to look
02:36 specifically because that's where you find shops like this
02:38 that's where you find all the cool little hidden gems
02:41 and with so many colourful collectibles on the shelves
02:43 we had to ask Aidan what are the real holy grail items
02:46 that he'd love to see in stock
02:48 for stock for the shop, for me there's two
02:50 stock wise we really really want transformers
02:55 I've struggled since opening to get good quality
02:58 early 80s transformers
03:01 I'd really really like a good boxed original Optimus Prime
03:06 a good Megatron, Megatron's another one that's really tough
03:10 but for me personally, I'm a wrestling guy
03:13 so anything Ban-Ban Bigelow related
03:17 that was my favourite guy
03:19 that's who I'd like to get hold of a couple of rare pieces of his
03:24 some ring worn stuff
03:26 if there's anybody who sees this and has that
03:28 it's a billion to one chance but
03:30 come and see me, I'm your guy
03:32 that I would say would be the grail items
03:35 but please bring us transformers, we need them
03:38 we need them
03:40 [BLANK_AUDIO]