Customer profile
What was the name of your video store?
Video Palace
Where was the store located?
Tinley Park, Illinois (United States)
When did you start shopping at this store?
1987
Describe your video store - what did it look like? What were its distinguishing
features?
It was fairly extensive for a video store in the late-1980s. It had a pretty large foreign film section.
What were the employees and/or owners like, and what kinds of interactions
did you have with them? What particularly memorable exchanges or events
do you remember?
The owner was a pretty noce guy. He worked the store every night. I used to pick up a lot of arthouse films and foreign films, which was different from most customers so we usually struck up a conersation each time I went in. His wife and daughters also worked the store but I did not talk to them.
What other services/products did the store offer besides the rental or sale
of videos? Did this change over time?
I know they sold something else, but I can't remember. Whatever it was they continued to sell it until they went out of business in the mid-1990s.
What video formats did the store offer (i.e. VHS, Beta, Laserdisc)? Where were
different formats kept in the store?
VHS as far as I recall.
In addition to mainstream Hollywood movies, what other kinds of videotapes
(for example children's, exercise, or X-rated) did the store rent/sell? Where were these
videos found in the store, and how often did you rent or purchase them?
Can't recall.
Did you tend to rent or buy videos? Why?
rent videos. I was a straving graduate student at the time.
During the period that you shopped at this store, what changes did you see?
More mainstream films as time went on.
Is this store still open? If not, when did it close?
No. Some time around 1994.
In your own words, tell the story of your first VCR/video player. Where
and when did you buy it, and why did you decide to make the purchase?
One of my mom's boyfriends bought a new one and gave us the old one.
Did you ever rent a VCR or other hardware (a camera, for instance)? If so,
how often and why?
Once in college we rented a VCR and watched "A Clockwork Orange" This would have been in 1987.