Parks' Record Rack: Serving Southeast Texas Flavor For 39 Years

Texas' first oil gusher began in 1901 at the Spindletop rig in Beaumont, and it has yet to go dry. Since the 1950s, the east Texas Gulf Coast has also been a boomtown for local acts from Tex Ritter and Janis Joplin to George Jones and Clay Walker.
The Record Rack surfaced as an independent retailer here 39 years ago, hoping to snare dollars generated by the local oil economy by selling music from up-and-coming local acts.
Today, the store boasts 22,000 titles, and store owner Vivien Parks, 83, still likes to predict who'll make the Billboard charts from the well of Texas talent from Nederland to Port Arthur.
'Mark Chesnutt was just a young boy of 12 or 13 when he'd come in with his father,' says Parks of Chesnutt, a Beaumont native now on MCA Nashville. 'He kept bringing in these records he'd made himself, and he sold every one. When we played 'Too Cold At Home,' I just knew he'd get that on a major label.'
The Record Rack has the swamp music of Texas/Louisiana bayou fish camps, such as Leon's, as well as the Western swing of Beaumont honky-tonks like Cutters and the Lone Star Saloon. Around 1990, Chesnutt was discovered at Cutters. Soon after, a former member of his group, Tracy Byrd, was also discovered and is now on MCA Nashville. Wayne Toups & Zydecajun, on Mercury, often perform at the Lone Star Saloon.
Parks says the Record Rack is well-stocked with these local acts--and with everything else. 'Today, our reputation is that when you can't find it anywhere else, we will have it,' she says. 'We don't even advertise now, because they know we've been here since 1959.'
Besides regular music fans, the Record Rack supplies two other types of consumers around petroleum-rich east Texas. There are truck drivers who'd rather have audiotapes than CDs and jukebox operators who want a wide selection of 45 rpm singles. The Record Rack has 9,000 titles on vinyl; besides the array of 45s, it has about 1,000 LPs at $7.98 each. It also stocks about 5,000 cassettes and 6,500 CDs.
'I buy 800 to 900 of the singles at a time from Gotham Distributing Corp. in Ardmore, Pa.,' says Parks. The nonreturnable 45s are $2.49 each, so patrons must test them for scratches or flaws. And never mind that Mark Chesnutt had a top 10 hit on Billboard's Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart with 'Bubba Shot The Jukebox.' Many Wurlitzer coin-op machines are still in Texas homes.
Due to its mixed clientele over the years, the Record Rack has a varied product array. The store does about 35% of its business in R&B/soul, 24% in traditional black gospel/contemporary Christian, 20% in country, Cajun, and zydeco, 10% in rock, 5% each in jazz and AC, and 1% in classical/opera. The Record Rack buys its Cajun and zydeco CDs from Floyd's Wholesale Distributing Co. in Ville Platte, La.
'We want the public to make the distinction between the chains like Best Buy and us,' says Carol Young, Parks' daughter. Young says 1997 revenues were up at least 10%-15% over the previous year.
The Record Rack's expert on new acts is Mike Besson, Parks' 32-year-old grandson. He also books 40 to 50 dates a year as a DJ at weddings and parties. 'I keep up with the Beaumont nightclub scene,' he says. 'I like Kevin Johnson--he sounds like Aaron Tippin, and his lyrics are really great. There's also Zona Jones--his voice is like George Strait's, and he goes onstage at Cutters during the week. Everybody seems to like Key West, too, and Ronnie Vaughn, who is usually at the Lone Star Saloon.'
The Golden Triangle--as the area is known--has regional live entertainment all year. The Record Rack stocks up for many festivals in Beaumont, including the Neches River Festival during April and the South Texas State Fair in October. Nearby celebrations in Port Arthur include the Mardi Gras of Southeast Texas in February, the Pleasure Island Music Festival during April, and the Gulf Coast Jam in July.
The 11th annual Janis Joplin Birthday Bash, held in January, was cause for celebration for local favorites ZZ Top. During the bash, the trio was inducted into the Hall of Fame at the Museum of the Gulf Coast in Port Arthur. Also inducted were Frankie Ford ('Sea Cruise,' a 1959 smash), Dale & Grace ('I'm Leaving It Up To You,' 1963), and Johnny Preston ('Running Bear,' 1959).
Today, the proprietors of the Record Rack can't even begin to count how many 45s, LPs, and CDs the store has sold for all of the 40-plus members of the Museum of the Gulf Coast Hall of Fame. These include J.P. Richardson (aka the Big Bopper), Tex Ritter, Johnny and Edgar Winter, George Jones, Aubrey 'Moon' Mullican, Jimmy Clanton, Clarence 'Gatemouth' Brown, and Percy Sledge.
However, because it is managed by three generations of the same family, the Record Rack identifies with music fans of all ages. 'We have seniors over 65 who come in here, and they may ask for Guy Lombardo,' says Young. 'We don't look at them as if we don't know who he is.'
The Record Rack modestly opened around 1959 inside a Beaumont appliance store that belonged to Parks' late brother George Kojak. 'He was a very religious Baptist--he'd gotten ordained--and he didn't want me to deal in anything but gospel and classical,' says Parks, who was grateful for the space. 'However, I was barely making a living.'
By 1960, Parks began renting a store next door to I.B. Johnson's grocery. That space was about half the size of the Record Rack's present size of 2,500 square feet. 'I could hardly wait on the customers by myself,' she says. 'They just loved it there, and I made a lot of money.'
The Record Rack constructed its own building--with the help of Parks' late brother Lewis E. Kojak--in the spring of 1965. It's at the same location today. 'We had the mayor of Beaumont here for the ribbon-cutting, and everyone sent me flowers,' says Parks.
Today, the Record Rack does business the old-fashioned way, one dollar at a time. The inventory isn't on a database, and the store doesn't even have a fax machine for orders.
Nonetheless, Parks says she still buys direct from most of the majors: 'RCA, Columbia, MCA, Capitol, PolyGram--I still buy from all of them after all these years,' she says. 'I've always paid my bills by the 10th of the month, and I've never owed a dime to anyone. If I can't afford it, I don't get it.'
Local real-estate developers have asked the Record Rack to lease at the region's malls. 'In 39 years, we've never failed to grow where we've always been,' says Parks. 'When I tell my customers they want me to move, they say 'Don't.' '
Parks also likes the 'old-fashioned' method of personnel training. She notes that her employees don't just smile; they wish everybody well and tell customers to take care of themselves. It's an in-store demeanor that has served Parks well for four decades.
'We had a lot of fun when I began the Record Rack, especially with the six radio stations around Beaumont, Houston, and Dallas,' she says. 'For example, nobody would play 'Mr. Record Man' by Willie Nelson, but I liked it then,' says Parks. 'My favorite DJ was Gordon Baxter, but they'd all ask my opinion, from Slim Watts to Al Caldwell. After Willie got on the air, he came in one day to thank me, and he took me to dinner.'
George Jones has done autograph signings at the Record Rack. Over the years, so have Freddy Fender and Tammy Wynette.
Like the crude from the oil fields, though, the Record Rack is always being refined. Parks says she's still thinking of expanding the store to include departments like Tejano. She notes, 'My mother used to say to me, 'If it works, don't change it. Do better.' '

(c) BPI Communications, 1998 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED