Vintage Stock launches franchising effort

The stores’ stock may be secondhand, but the owners of Vintage Stock think their franchising idea is first-rate.
The Joplin-based chain, specializing in new and used movies, music and video games, is in the final stages of developing a plan to offer franchises.
The business began as a single store, The Book Barn, but now has 10 corporate-owned stores, including two in Springfield. While the owners plan to double the
corporation’s holdings in the next two years, they’ve kicked a franchise plan into high gear through a Chicago-based partnership.
Vintage Stock owners Rodney Spriggs, Ken Caviness and Steve Wilcox in 2004 joined Craig Slaven of Chicago-based Franchise Architects in 2004 to create Vintage Stock Franchising Systems Inc.

Goal for growth
The goal is to open 40 new franchises in the next 12 months.
Slaven estimated that the partners have invested more than $400,000 toward the initial franchise setup. He said the company is hoping to lure multiple-store franchise owners rather than have dozens of stores owned by dozens of different owners.
“In order to get 50, 100 or 500 franchises, we don’t want to get 50, 100 or 500 different franchisees. We want a businessperson who’s an achiever who can open up anywhere from five to 10 to 15 stores and own that particular market with us,” he said.
Slaven said the initial franchise fee is $30,000, but the company offers incentives to franchisees who own multiple locations. Total costs for opening a new location are estimated at $350,000 to $400,000.
No franchises have been sold yet, though Slaven said the company is expecting to have its first face-to-face meetings in the coming weeks.
The company’s long-term goal is to have 150 franchise stores in the next three years in markets including large cities such as Chicago, St. Louis and Dallas and college towns such as Columbia, Lawrence, Kan., and Fayetteville or Little Rock, Ark. Locally, the group hopes to add new stores in Springfield, Joplin and Branson.
There were five Vintage Stock locations when Spriggs, Caviness and Wilcox bought the company, then known as Book Barn LLC, in 2002 for approximately $2 million. They have since doubled the store count, with locations in Joplin, Springfield, Overland Park, Kan., Tulsa, Okla., and Springdale and Rogers, Ark.
All but one of those stores – Caveman by Vintage Stock on South Glenstone in Springfield – has been renovated to match the home store in Joplin, which is being used as a prototype for new stores. Spriggs said that the Brentwood Center location, 2856 S. Glenstone Ave., is going to be renovated in the next six months.
The Town & Country Springfield store, 2631 N. Kansas Expressway, opened a year ago.
$17 billion industry
The secondhand industry is big business, according to DFC Intelligence, which reports on the interactive entertainment industry, namely video games. DFC Intelligence reports that the secondhand video game industry is valued at $17 billion.
New video games continue to do well in retail markets as well, as DFC reported that the top 17 game producers had 2004 revenues totaling $24.5 billion.
Spriggs feels that his company is ahead of the pre-owned retail curve.
“What we’ve been doing for the last 25 years is now being called the newest retailing trend,” he said. “It’s just that the product line has changed slightly. Instead of selling Atari games, we’re selling (Playstation 2) and Xbox; instead of selling LPs, we’re selling CDs; instead of selling VHS, we’re selling DVD.”
Part of the impetus for successful secondhand stores is low cost of inventory; most items sold in the store are purchased used from customers. Spriggs said that’s probably why the resale concept is becoming so popular.
“When you’re a new merchandise retailer, you beat each other up on these products, with price wars on CDs and DVDs. Those companies, their margins aren’t very good,” he said. “We knew the potential of this all along – you just had to get the right mix of people in.”