Discogs is pulling together a directory, and the platform needs your help.
Earlier this year, a Discogs user, named Ben Kessler from Washington, D.C., launched a request via the site’s forum. In the thread, he asked people to help contribute to a directory of Black-owned record stores across the world. You can access the directory and add your own comments here.
So far, the spreadsheet includes record stores across Chicago, Brooklyn, Toronto, Houston, New Orleans and more. New York’s Moodies Records is listed, along with San Diego’s Fivespace and Chicago’s 606 Records.
Kessler wrote on Discogs, “The basis for the list was a list of 10 Black-owned record stores Okayplayer published a few months ago. The article that accompanied the list focused on the struggles that small businesses were facing in the early weeks of commercial shutdowns.”
“After the murder of George Floyd, it became common to share lists of Black-owned businesses serving particular cities or interests. People were already doing their best to stay loyal to their favourite small business — record store or otherwise. And as mainstream America turned its attention to the indiscriminate murder of Black people by the police, I think many people began thinking about how they spent their money differently.” [sic]
He added, “White men are the vast majority of folks in record stores on both sides of the counter. This is despite the fact that we are often buying recordings created by Black artists or by people who owe, to say the last, a debt of gratitude to Black creators.”