NEW YORK — During the years they ran NYCD, a small record store, Sal Nunziato and Tony Sachs had their disagreements. Sal cringed when Tony played songs by schlock lounge singers. Tony winced at his partner's passion for Dixieland jazz.
They agreed, however, on the store's most humiliating moment: Earlier this year, a Yellow Book saleswoman came into NYCD and urged them to buy an ad, saying it might boost sales and win back customers who download songs off the Internet.
Just then, the saleswoman's assistant plucked a rock CD off the wall.
"Oh, don't buy that," her boss blurted out. "I'll burn you a copy at home."
Sal and Tony love telling the story, even though it now has a bitter ending. They closed their shop on Christmas Eve because its once-robust business had virtually disappeared. NYCD (New York Compact Disc) was one of the city's last independent shops selling new and used records.
"We gave this place everything we had for 12 years," Tony said. "Sal and I love music with all our hearts. We live and breathe it, every day. But in the end, the business and our customers didn't love us."
There is plenty of blame to go around. New recordings don't sell like they used to. Chain stores lured customers away with lower prices. Casual buyers who once crowded into the store began downloading songs.
These discouraging trends have been plaguing independent record stores across the nation. In Los Angeles, the most recent victim was Aron's Records, which greatly influenced the way pop music was sold -- including the sale of used LPs -- when it opened on Melrose Avenue in 1965. The store moved to Highland Avenue in 1990, and announced last month that it was closing.
What hurt the most at NYCD, however, was that many loyal customers also stopped coming to the store on Manhattan's Upper West Side. Shoppers who once spent $100 for Beatles bootleg recordings were now buying strollers and video games for their kids. They owned thousands of CDs, but there was less room for music in their lives.
"Many of the people who were our lifeblood disappeared, and the store died," Sal said several days before closing. "It was like we were laid out in a funeral home."
The two owners, both born in New York, became obsessed with music at an early age. They spent hours listening to the radio and bought hundreds of records.
