It’s hard to imagine the beloved Hoodlums music store has moved away from the MU basement, but when it comes to the economy and what’s best for business, times like these call for desperate measures. The doors to the brand new, fully renovated Hoodlums opened on Sept. 20 in a new location.

“The economy is tricky… we really had to feel it was the right situation. When this situation presented itself, we looked at it from every angle, just like we did when ASU presented itself. Then we decide to go ahead and give it a shot,” Steve Wiley, co-owner of Hoodlums explains.

Hoodlum’s owners Steve Wiley and Kristian Luce decided to terminate their lease after the fire. Both thought the best decision would be to find a new location instead of waiting 5 months for the building to get rebuilt. “I was excited, right after 10 years of running a business you’re always nervous, but it was something we’ve been doing a long time and we couldn’t wait to get back open,” Luce says.

The Memorial Union fire last November caused the downstairs music store to be relocated to 6434 S. McClintock Drive in Tempe. “It’s not as convenient as the ASU location, but the economy these days forces businesses to desperate measures. I’m pretty sure this has been a smart decision on their behalf,” secondary education sophomore Jennifer Rennon says. Rennor began buying her CDs and movies from Hoodlums last year.

“[The fire] shut us down for 10 months, and began a chain of events that had us down for a while. Once we decided not to move back into the MU, we started looking around for a place,” Wiley says.
The name Hoodlums traces back to the Stevie Wonder song “I Wish.” In the song it says “hang out with those hoodlums in the night.”

“I used to run ZIA and all the stores before we opened Hoodlums up. I would send faxes out every week at my store and tell the staff what was going on, and I would always start by saying, ‘hello my fellow ZIA Hoodlums.’ It’s a term of endearment in the world of record store geeks, like me, and so when we were trying to figure out a name for the store and since there was a connection to it, everyone said ‘that’s perfect,’ ” Wiley says.

Hoodlums first opened in 1998 by founders Steve Wiley, Kristian Luce and Lloyd Hummel. It was located in a 500 square foot space in the basement of the MU at ASU. Lloyd now works with Universal Music in Los Angeles while Steve and Kristian run the store. “After 10 years we certainly have learned to work together,” Wiley says.

According to Wiley, the typical customers at Hoodlums are people that are serious about music and movies. They recognize a good independent store is a great place to go where you can run into knowledgeable people, get a reasonable price and do some trading. “We have served and will serve casual music fans as well, we feel we really need to go for the core person who is really serious about it that views having their music as a collection; and all their movies for that matter,” Wiley says.

“The schedule is the biggest change. At ASU we are operating weekdays, over here it’s in the evening and more importantly on the weekends. Out here its just a different schedule, we’ve been only open [since Sep. 20th] so there’s going to be a lot of different trends and learning for us. Luckily we still have a great customer base, we have a big e-mail list, and we have a lot of loyal customers,” Wiley says.

The space of this store has allowed them to add used vinyl, which is a huge change. The additional music variety is doing very well and continues to grow.

“It feels like a record store. It’s much more spacious, it has better lighting and is at a semi-convenient location. I wouldn’t say the location is better for students but it will get better business from regular people. Most of their business was from students when they were at ASU. I think they will do a lot better business wise,” Duncan Carey, an ASU marketing junior and former Hoodlums employee, says.

Hoodlums is also getting more involved in the community. The most recent event they did was an event with Changing Hands Bookstore, Steve Wiley had a chance to interview Tom Moon, the author of the book “1000 Recordings to Hear Before you Die.”

As far as sales go, the store now has more foot traffic. ASU’s location was more unpredictable when it came to customer flow. There were times during the year where the store was just slow, such as holidays, vacations, breaks and weekends. Economics junior Mike Penno says “I’m going to continue to buy my records at Hoodlums just because I trust their opinions and they always provide the best customer service.”

With their new location, atmosphere and vibe, the Hoodlums are back in business and ready to turn up the volume and keep students, as well as Tempe residents, in the groove.

Reach the reporter at melissa.lis@asu.edu.