Rataj Berard
from back to front: l.-r.: Andy Fox, Nick Propheter, Helen Boldt, Lewis Peterson
Lewis Peterson wants to clear up a couple of misconceptions about Four Star Video Cooperative, Madison’s “little video store that could.” First, for the people who saw the store’s April 30 announcement, but didn’t read it to the end: Four Star is not closing.
Peterson says he thinks the announcement that “the current staff intends to collectively move forward into the next chapter” of their lives also gave the wrong impression about Four Star’s very existence. It is not failing.
“I don’t think a week goes by when some random person doesn’t stop by and say ‘A video store? How are you guys still open?’” says Peterson, one of four workers who purchased the store in 2014.
It’s 2019, after all, and we’re all supposed to be streaming movies. You’re not supposed to go to physical stores anymore. But tell that to Four Star’s devoted fan base, which continues to enjoy choosing movies from a vast physical collection (25,000 titles from Alphaville to Zardoz), maintained by an extremely knowledgeable staff.
Four Star is indeed alive and well and living on North Broom Street. But the current owners — Peterson, Nick Propheter, Andy Fox and Helen Boldt — are looking to move on to different ventures in the next few months. They want to, as Propheter says, “alleviate the pressures of ownership.” So they are looking for someone to take over the operation.
Confusion about the store’s future likely started when the owners scaled back the hours, opening later and closing earlier. It is now open every day except Wednesday from noon to 8 p.m., rather than the previous hours of 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Beyond these tweaks, there is no change in the operation.
Peterson says the business is healthy, and the best-case scenario is for a new group of people to step in and run Four Star as a nonprofit. “It would be a very easy transition for whoever wants to take ownership. The operation of the store is as smooth as can be. The business model works. The store sustains itself. The bills are paid. The initial loan is gone.” The store is compiling a list of interested parties and plans to hold a meeting to help jump-start the process for potential owners.
Peterson says the owners have no definite time frame in mind as they look for buyers. He concedes that they would not want to run the store indefinitely, but they are feeling hopeful that someone will step forward.
This is not the first time that friends of the 34-year old video store found the chimes of doom to be a false alarm. The store didn’t fail when it became an employee-owned cooperative in 2014, or when it moved from its original location on Henry Street to its current location on Broom. It didn’t sink after streaming became the norm, and it wasn’t muscled out by (the now defunct) Blockbuster. It didn’t fail when porn was removed from the once-notorious documentary shelf. Propheter recalls a time before he worked at Four Star when the store changed its 8 a.m.-2 a.m. open hours and thinking, “This is it.”
Maybe Four Star will continue to defy the odds. Some people worried when the owners of A Room of One’s Own — another business that has survived despite challenges — announced in 2016 that they were looking to retire. Last July, the store’s ownership was transferred to store employees Gretchen Treu and Jes Lukes, who found a silent partner in bestselling author Patrick Rothfuss.
