A Surrey store parking lot will again be abuzz with vintage audio on Sunday, June 8.
Innovative Audio's annual "garage sale" in Newton will involve vendors selling gear and records at 13255 78 Ave.
During an event billed as B.C.'s largest vintage audio and record garage sale, dealers can set up no charge, and admission is free for attendees, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
"It's over 15 years, getting closer to 20 now of doing this," said Mark Smith, store employee.
"It's anything audio-related," he added. "We get between 35 and 50 vendors. It's on a Sunday so we've got the lot to ourselves, nobody here, and they all set up. People come and go, check it out. It's steady with people taking stuff to their cars, coming back. I've noticed a lot more record-buyers in recent years."
Inside the store, which claims the title of Canada's largest vintage audio emporium, it sure feels like a museum full of old receivers, jukeboxes, "ghetto blasters," classic rock posters, 8-track tapes, turntables, T-shirts and more.
So, what's the fascination with vintage audio and related stuff?
"I had a guy explain it well to me the other day," Smith recalled. "He was a new client and looked around the store and says, 'I guess it's a prerequisite to have grey hair to be in this store.' I think it's definitely more of a generational thing. But a lot of the older folks, their kids have also gotten really attached to it (vintage audio), and they're into it now too."
Seems like a lot of people who walk through the door want to relive their youth.
"Maybe they have more time on their hands, they're retired, and they come in here and see some of the stuff they used to have, and old records, and they start doing it again as a hobby," Smith said.
"It's funny because we get some millennials in here and they've never had a chance to look at and play with cassettes, right. They're just enamoured by cassette and the tape, the mechanics of it. And the receivers here, the gear, a lot of them light up like they've never seen before."
Business-wise, the shop is super busy with repair jobs right now, much more than sales, according to Smith, meaning anyone with, say, a Pioneer, Marantz, Sansui or Kenwood system in need of a fix will have to wait many weeks, even months.
"There's about 150 repair jobs in the queue here right now, and there's one repair guy. He's gone for the day, but the board says it all," Smith said, pointing a wall at the store entrance. "The reason we're so nuts right now is he did go on holidays for three weeks, so instead of the four- to six-week waiting period, it's up to nine or 10 weeks, pretty crazy."
Even for old systems that don't sound like new, their collectibility has gone through the roof, along with prices. One turntable displayed in the store, a beautiful Transcriptor Skeleton model, has a price tag of $3,499, not including the clear yellow-vinyl Sun record awaiting the needle.
"Some of the bigger pieces are sitting more than they're being bought at this point," Smith admitted. "Seems like if somebody wants something high-end or expensive or collectible, they hold on to it now and get it repaired if needed, right.
"You know, we used to think a lot of these older '70s home receivers were rare, but they're still everywhere. Most of our equipment gets repaired out of Surrey. You'd be surprised how much of this vintage gear lives in Surrey, it's just hidden away in a rec room or garage somewhere."