The Revival of Vinyl Records via the Youth at this Mumbai Record Store

“Initially, we would get more middle-aged and old people to the store, however, demographics have changed over the last two years, where there is a young crowd attracted to the vinyls,” says 37-year-old Jude de Souza as we sit inside his Mahim’s vinyl listening store that plays the softer tunes of 'Happier Than Ever' by Billie Eilish.

The Revolver Club was first opened in 2016, when it just offered vinyl records. Cut to 2025, it houses a vast collection of records, including English, Bollywood and Indie, that come to the display for people to choose from if they wish to buy. Just beside the records collection, a few are open for the people to listen to as per their choice. “I want to tell people that whether they are interested in rock and roll, hip hop, or Bollywood Hindustani music, they can come here and explore,” he says.

In between the records collection and the music systems on the wall right opposite it are three tables in this 350 sq feet area of The Revolver Club, which reopened just two months ago. “The EZ-fi system is new since we realised that the younger generation is not very fond of the conventional hi-fi systems,” says de Souza.

It is the young, indeed, who surround us as we speak on this fine evening inside the store. There is no doubt that the young crowd — compromising both millennials and Gen Z have been instrumental in driving the culture of revival across domains and the sense of ownership is getting many forgotten products back to the mainstream buying which suggests, in this case, that one might not have a turntable, but would like to buy the vinyl due to the old-world charm attached to it.

Jude de Souza shares that out of the 95% of the sales that are driven through e-commerce, people mostly belonging to the age group of 30 and under have been driving the sales. “We have seen the jump in hip-hop sales. Taylor Swift in the pop section has changed things for the female demographic. Although it has paused since Swift has not put up something recently,” he says, adding that a lot of his clients work with him because he is catering to “younger audiences”.

Out of all the records that are sold, ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ and other Indie artists have been sold the most. Recently, the store also sold around 200 copies of the Peter Cat Recording Co. rock band in a matter of 11 hours. The brand even sold a turntable costing 5.5 lakh a day before our visit, and while recalling, de Souza, “Vinyl records are sold the most in quantity while the high-end music systems have the most value for sales.”

A high-end music culture

Vinyl records were at their peak of popularity during the period of the 1950s and 1960s, while they remained widely used and sold till the 1980s. It witnessed a fall after a rise in digital inventions like cassette tapes and CDs.

Fondly recalling his teenage years, de Souza shares that he had once visited a high-end audio store around Wilson College in southern Mumbai. “I went there with a CD to listen to music on a high-end system. They asked me to go because I had no money,” he says, adding that he was resentful after the incident. “It struck me. I knew I had no money, but I knew one day, I would have, and then, I would not go back there,” de Souza laments.

On the contrary, the founder also accepts that he is running a premium business which can only survive on customers with deep pockets. “It took me a while to realise that I was running a premium business,” he says. While the records might start from Rs 3,000, the players cost lakhs.

Mr. de Souza, who was always interested in high-end music, thought of selling records when he was in the US, where he also completed his education. “America has a huge market for records; had I opened such a place there, it would have just been a brick on the wall,” de Souza says. Drawing a parallel line with India, he says, “Most hobbies here are at the entry level for a business here. The art and culture do not have the same trajectory.”

While he sold at least 16 to 17,000 records last year, de Souza states that in India, such a culture is yet to develop, and people often find it  “unusual” for it to be a business idea. “People have found it ‘strange’ that I collect ‘black tawa (pan) like objects!”  he laughs.

However, de Souza considers himself lucky to have been able to give a profitable shape to his passion. “I always knew that I could not sustain just by selling records,” he says talking about how he aimed this space in Mahim, initially owned by his father, to turn into a prototype of his dream of building a community and a business thriving on records, music systems, and even coffee for others to think of it’s franchisee.

A glimpse of vintage with the hint of caffeine

This revamp of The Revolver Club has also allowed some space for a few vintage watches that are here on display. They range from Rolex HMT, and De Souza mentions that they are slowly catching up in terms of sales as well.

Mihir Lapalikar, the director of The Revolver Club, in a conversation, says that the community events like listening sessions, movie clubs and even ‘vintage watch meet-ups’ are regular phenomena to ensure the community’s participation. “Instead of running advertisements, this is how we're trying for the space to flourish,” the 25-year-old says.

However, another new addition, the Hyderabad-based coffee brand Katha, has been an important element in this makeover, as De Souza says. “It turned out to be a huge culture and got popularised by other brands, and I got to take advantage of that too,” he chuckles while sipping his coffee.

In the last two months, if not for the records, the younger crowd have found their way here for the coffee. “Many come here for the coffee and get introduced to the records and music systems,” says Eram Sayyed, 26 , adding that it is through working here that she has also got to learn a little about the vinyl records and systems.

While the COVID-19 pandemic forced the Revolved Club operations to fully go online, the founder believes that the omnichannel presence of the store has helped in spreading awareness of the records. “Building physical stores is only viable if there is an e-commerce to back it up,” de Souza says, who is opening another outlet in Bengaluru next month, also the second largest customer base for him after Mumbai.

Meanwhile, having shipped the records to places like Andaman Nicobar islands, and cities like Delhi NCR, Hyderabad, Chennai, and, even Pune, de Souza, who likes listening to hard rock music, says that he will have more time to listen to records once he gets old.