Noah Kahan is one of the hottest stars in the world, selling millions of albums, attending the Grammys and selling out arenas.
But when the Stick Season star wanted to give his album a charts boost, it was a Dundee music shop he turned to.
He took the time to sign 500 copies of his album for a special numbered edition to sell through Assai.
In the streaming age, a retailer being able to sell this number of physical copies can make all the difference to chart positions.
A week after they went on sale, Kahan followed acts like Blur, Liam Gallagher and Green Day – who have also provided unique versions of their LPs to Assai – to have a number one.
Shop closure but online sales boom
Having this level of sales and influence in the music business hasn’t always been the case for Assai owner Keith Ingram.
In fact, his first independent music shop in Stirling closed its doors after only two years – but Keith saw the opportunity of internet sales.
“We were selling more online than over the counter,” he recalled.
“When the lease was coming to an end in 2004, I thought let’s pursue the online aspect.
“That completely snowballed. Mostly selling through marketplaces like eBay and Amazon, within four years this was a £2 million a year business.”
The birth of Assai record store
Then operating as HTS Scotland, the business embraced the resurgence of the vinyl format, which had opportunity for higher margins.
Keith saw the opportunity to try again with a physical record store, opening the first Assai in Broughty Ferry in 2015.
It wasn’t an immediate success, but the team learned quickly how to build a following.
“The online sales grew to the point we had a lot of stock in our warehouse,” Keith said.
“By that point I was concerned about being so reliant on Amazon and eBay and wanted to adapt the business as there could be a change in the market we couldn’t control.
“I thought, let’s open a shop and see what happens.
“The first year was tough going. We hadn’t embraced social media. We had a loyalty programme but didn’t know what to do with it. But we started to build a community.
“The numbers on our mailing list kept increasingly organically, we got better at using Facebook. We were learning as we were going.”
Live music events offer more for customers
Assai opened a second shop in Edinburgh in 2017 which coincided with the start of another major part of its business – hosting live music events.
Dundee band The View approached Assai saying they wanted to do something to help sell copies of their album.
The conversations led to an event at Church in Dundee. In 2018 Snow Patrol performed three different half hour sets in the same venue.
Since then Assai has hosted dozens of concerts with stars like Lewis Capaldi, The Snuts and Anne-Marie and also benefits from record sales at the events.
With the Broughty Ferry lease coming to an end, Assai made the move to Dundee’s Union Street in 2019.
“We wanted to be in Dundee city centre to take advantage of higher footfall,” said Keith.
“The Waterfront area was being developed and Union Street was a good fit for us.
“The bigger shop also lent itself to hosting more live events.”
In a stroke of good fortune, Assai invested heavily in its website before the pandemic, when it had to close its shops.
Although it still sells through Amazon and eBay, the vast majority of sales are now direct.
Special ‘obi’ editions of selected albums Assai sells – which have a hand numbered strip with the album title in Japanese – gives the store unique, collectable products to sell.
But Keith believes it is also due to the store’s efforts in building a community that people choose to spend with them.
He said: “It’s all about customer service, being part of the community and offering something places like HMV and Amazon don’t. I think that builds a bit of loyalty.
“Our shop is big enough to hold events and meet and greets.
“The obi editions give us something different. For Noah Kahan to sign 500 records for us, a small Dundee business, is amazing. But it helped him get a number one.”
More record shops for Assai?
Assai opened a Glasgow shop last year and is looking for more expansion opportunities. The website sales indicate where they already have a strong customer base. Aberdeen and Perth shops might be next.
The business, which now has 33 staff and annual sales of £3.5m, continues to invest on its website while its Edinburgh shop undergoes a refit.
In a time of struggling city centres, Keith said brick and mortar stores can still work – when combined with online.
He said: “You’ve got to understand your customers and why they come to you. You’ve got to build a community around the shop. It’s easier in some businesses than others.
“I’m upbeat on the future of bricks and mortar but you have to tie it in with a website and social media. We get a lot of people who order on website and collect in store and things like that.
“Embracing social media as much as you can is essential. We’ve got a reach of 100,000 so it’s a reasonable number.
“Future plans definitely involve more shops. The plan is to reach out to locations where we have a customer base but don’t have a shop – places like Aberdeen and Perth.”
Dundee Matters
The Courier has recently launched an initiative aimed at finding solutions for the city centre’s problems – Dundee Matters.
Our first focus is on the high streets and as part of that we are looking for you to have your say in our survey.
Your responses will help guide our high street summit we are set to host this May. It is event with a focus on finding solutions which can help reverse the trajectory of the city centre.
Conversation