December 1966, London

The big day is here! Dave Godin has hired a friend Henry Giles to design the colours (mauve and blue) of the shop’s distinct exterior. Dave has cobbled together the money for the rent, I’ve helped us open accounts with UK distributors (EMI, Decca, Pye, etc) so we have some 45s and LPs to sell, we’ve put an add in Record Mirror music weekly paper…and we don’t have any rare import LPs to sell just yet! Guess whose already-played albums are part of our stock on Saturday December 10th at noon?? Yup, a few of my precious Aretha Franklin Columbia albums! We agree that once we get a US importer I’ll get new copies to replace any of my personal collection we sell…since Aretha is not yet a household name in Britain among even dedicated soul fans, I’m able to retrieve my copy by the 1st week of January!!