 Every record collector has one that got away. Maybe you sold it, gave it away, lost it during a move, or held it in your hands at a record store and decided you'd come back another day. Sometimes it isn't even particularly rare or valuable. It just means something to you. Steve didn't lose one record. He gave up his entire collection in the 1980s. Decades later, he started buying it back. That decision would eventually lead to a flea market, a small room in the back of a thrift shop, a dinosaur with a story stretching back to 1925, and The Vinyl Dinosaur, an independent record store in Bayville, New Jersey. But none of that was the plan. It Started With AerosmithMusic had been around Steve for as long as he can remember. He was five or six when he started playing his parents' 45s on their record player. In his late teens, he picked up a guitar and has been playing ever since. “Music has always figured deeply in my life in one way or another.” By the 2010s, vinyl had started creeping back into his life. Steve was seeing records at flea markets and thinking seriously about rebuilding the collection he'd given up. One of his college students encouraged him to go for it. “It didn't take much prompting though!” he admits. The first album back was Aerosmith's Rocks. From there, things escalated quickly. Steve started buying entire boxes of records and eventually recovered most of what had once been in his collection, along with plenty that hadn't. As he puts it, he had his old collection back “and then some.” The problem with buying boxes of records is that you don't necessarily want everything in the box. Steve had accumulated enough extras that he started selling them at a flea market. Within four months, an opportunity came along to open a small record store in the back of a thrift shop. He took it. The little store worked. In fact, it worked well enough that within two and a half years Steve needed to find somewhere bigger. What had started as an attempt to rebuild an old record collection had somehow become a business. There was just one rather obvious question left. Why the dinosaur?  The Dinosaur Was Already ThereYou could probably invent a good story about why someone would call a record store The Vinyl Dinosaur. Steve didn't have to. Bayville already had one. The town's dinosaur arrived in 1935, but its story goes back even further. According to Steve, it was originally a movie theatre prop created for the 1925 film The Lost World. Somehow, it eventually found its way to Bayville, where it stood outside a taxidermy shop and became one of those wonderfully strange local landmarks that people simply come to associate with a place. Just before Steve opened his store, there was an attempt to restore the aging dinosaur. The project became caught up in local politics and, in Steve's view, the finished restoration didn't quite do the old landmark justice. So when he started thinking about a name for his record store, the answer came quickly. “I took the mantle of the dinosaur by naming my record store The Vinyl Dinosaur.”  The dinosaur in the store's logo became its mascot, appropriately named TVD. There's something fitting about a piece of Bayville's past becoming the identity of a record store that existed because Steve had gone looking for a piece of his own.  A Place to Hang OutWalk into The Vinyl Dinosaur today and vinyl is only part of what you'll find. There are books, movies, art, cameras, video games, musical instruments and whatever else Steve thinks might be worth discovering. “There is no sense in selling what everyone else sells!” he says. That attitude extends beyond what's sitting on the shelves. Steve describes The Vinyl Dinosaur as a “community hub.” People come in to dig through records, but they also meet people, talk about music and hang around. Steve is perfectly happy if somebody comes in and doesn't buy anything at all. He thinks of the people who shop there more as friends than customers.  And then there's the stage. Steve remembers what it was like being a young guitarist and struggling to find somewhere to play. Once he had a space of his own, he could do something he wished someone had done for him. “Growing up I could never find a place to play, so I built a stage for the younger bands to play on free of charge, many of them playing live for the first time in their lives.” Young bands are getting onstage, some for the first time, and Steve says he's simply happy to see them getting the opportunity. A kid who couldn't find somewhere to play grew up and built the stage himself.  “Holy Sh*t! I’ve Been Looking for This!”One of Steve's favourite moments at The Vinyl Dinosaur happened when a customer was digging through the records. Suddenly, Steve heard him shout: “Holy sh*t! I’ve been looking for this and never thought that I’d see it again! This album changed my life!” Naturally, Steve wanted to know what he'd found. From the reaction, he was expecting some legendary record that everyone would immediately understand. He looked at it. Steve had no idea who the band was. Even better, the record was only $3. That's record collecting. One person's three-dollar record can be another person's missing piece. The price, pressing or value doesn't matter much when you've just found something you thought you'd never see again. It's also a moment that seems to sum up what Steve wanted The Vinyl Dinosaur to be. “It isn’t always about the money. It is more about making people happy.” For Steve, there isn't much more satisfying than hearing someone say they've been looking for an album for years. He wants coming into the store to be an experience, not simply a transaction. And people do come. Steve says visitors have arrived from across the United States and from outside the country, despite Bayville sitting within reach of the much bigger record-shopping destinations of New York City and Philadelphia. Some people vacationing in the area have even made The Vinyl Dinosaur a regular stop when they return. But perhaps the best way to understand why they keep coming back is still that guy standing over a $3 record. Steve gave up his vinyl collection in the 1980s. Decades later, he went looking for those records again. One of the first was Aerosmith's Rocks. Then came boxes, a flea-market table, a little shop and eventually The Vinyl Dinosaur. He went looking for something he'd left behind. Somewhere along the way, he built a place where other people could find theirs.  Keep Digging: More Record Store Stories From the U.S.The Vinyl Dinosaur is part of our growing Record Store Stories series, exploring the independent shops, owners and communities keeping record-store culture alive. 1) Tracks In Wax - Phoenix, Arizona A Phoenix record store that's been part of the city's music culture since 1982, now in the hands of a school principal who sees himself not simply as its owner, but as the steward of something worth carrying forward. READ THE STORY → 2) Time & Again - Sturtevant, Wisconsin Beatles singles bought with paper-route money, decades in music retail, time spent working alongside a young Al Jourgensen, and finally the “F— it” moment that led Ray to build the record store he wanted to see. READ THE STORY → 3) The Hidden Problem in Every Record Store That No One Talks About After spending a year inside independent record stores in New York and around the world, Andy kept noticing the same thing. Someone would discover an unfamiliar record, reach for their phone, and sometimes put the album back. What he found became a bigger story about record stores, music discovery and what happens when curiosity meets a record you've never heard before. READ THE STORY → 4) Explore Record Store Stories More independent record stores. More people behind the counter. More stories about the places where music discovery still happens. EXPLORE RECORD STORE STORIES → 5) Find Your Next Record Stories like The Vinyl Dinosaur are a reminder that finding the record can be part of the experience. Explore different ways to discover your next record, from independent shops to trusted online sources. FIND YOUR NEXT RECORD → Take Care of What You FindFinding the record is only part of the story. Keeping it clean and properly protected helps make sure it keeps spinning for years to come. Protect Your Records Premium inner and outer sleeves from Vinyl Storage Solutions. Vinyl Vibes readers save 10% with code VINYLVIBES10. Clean Your Records Keep used and new vinyl sounding its best with GrooveWasher. Vinyl Vibes readers in the U.S. save 10% with code VINYLVIBES10. 
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