Don’t fret - it’s open again
GUITAR SHOP REOPENS AFTER BIG REV-AMP
THIS is the stunning new interior of one of the North East’s largest guitar stores after a £100,000 revamp.
Guitar Guitar has been fully refurbished after ten years in the same Newcastle city centre shop.
The chain started in Edinburgh in 2004 and opened a branch in the Newgate Street shopping centre a year later before moving to its current home in 2008.
Now the store has reopened after a month-long revamp.
Sales director Steve Gray said: “We wanted to make more of the space we have because it is quite big for a guitar store.
“It bucks the trend of the ‘death of the High Street retail.’
“We do more business in store than we do online because it is almost a dream purchase - it is not a need to buy a new guitar, it is something you want to buy.
“It is like buying a pair of shoes – you want to try before you buy. Sometimes even in harder times we do pretty well and buck the trend a little bit.
“In the past I would say about 90% of our customers were professional musicians, people playing in working men’s clubs and things like that. Now it is more of a hobby.
“It is very easy now to learn and to record yourself but you need an instrument to do that with. If you look online it can be quite confusing and intimidating, thinking ‘where do I start?’”
On the trick to surviving on the high street these days, Gray added: “I think if you offer someone a different experience – we have a well-stocked comfortable store with staff who want to talk to you and help you buy the right thing.”