Two years ago, in June of 2018, we began our channel, rather modestly, by documenting closing Toys 'R Us stores in our area, as they were beginning to wind down as a going concern, during their liquidation process. The story goes back a bit farther than that, however. We had visited the Pittsburgh area back in April of that year, to attend a concert by my favorite pop vocalist and international meme star, Rick Astley. Through some of the retail oriented groups on Facebook, I had befriended established YouTube personality, WallieB26, and we also met up with him several times during the week of our Pittsburgh outing. We toured iconic dead malls such as Pittsburgh Mills as well as the fabled Century III Mall, with Wallie showing us around. During the trip, we did visit some of the other malls in the area that weren't "dead" and in some cases quite thriving at the time, The Mall at Robinson coming to mind. One night, however, Wallie took my husband and I to a location near and dear to his heart.
I speak of the Moon Township Kmart, one of several Kmarts that Wallie had documented during their liquidation process, until the final day they closed. Through watching these heartfelt documents about these, and particularly the Moon store, I, from afar, developed a bit of an emotional connection to the story of the final weeks of this store that meant so much to Wallie. His love and devotion to covering these locations is palpable. You can tell that he actually gives a damn about the store, and most importantly, about those whose livelihood those stores represent. His heart is truly in it.
The night we visited the Moon Township Kmart was a serious turning point for my husband and I. We enjoyed watching retail and mall videos as spectators and already had a great respect for those who make videos documenting our fading retail landscape. We arrived at this Kmart that I had seen in so many videos, and it was rather eerie, seeing it all closed up and lifeless. Wallie approached the front doors of the store before we did, as I was attempting to snap a few personal photos of the property before walking up. As my husband and I were observing, we noticed our new friend was having a "moment". Being back at his beloved Kmart had triggered an emotional response.
And it was at that moment, for my husband, that the whole thing "clicked". I already "got it" but my husband was a supportive partner only, prior to this night. He finally understood that these stories of retail are much bigger, more personal, and more important than "just another store closing". After walking around the Moon Kmart property for some time and taking more photos, our evening was concluded... but we were changed... challenged to think about what we were going to do with this new perspective.
My husband and I ended up talking for weeks about the trip we had taken, all the cool malls we had seen, the Moon Kmart incident, and we concluded at some point between April & June, that we needed to step up to the plate and contribute to the larger retail story in some way. I had already been taking photographs of local malls or malls we visited while traveling, and we had started to take photos of liquidating Kmarts and Toys 'R Us stores in our vicinity. I was posting these photos to retail oriented Facebook groups and enjoying the feedback and friendships I was forging during these months.
We had a talk one evening, that fateful night when we decided that we were going to go for it, and make a YouTube channel. Well, you have to have a name for your channel, and you have to choose the name carefully, so that it conveys what your channel and its ethos will be. Unlike many in the established YouTube scene, we decided against having our personalities be the focus, as we're not interested in being in front of the camera, preferring to be behind and let the properties do the talking. I fortuitously came up with the name "Raw & Real Retail" because it's alliterative, memorable, and projected the image I wanted our channel to represent. No fancy editing, no frills, just pure content. Oh, and eventually, with a funky jazz soundtrack. The music, and the "raw, real" nature of our presentations have become successful branding for our channel.
By not featuring the words "mall", "dead mall" or any limiting qualifiers, we didn't pigeonhole ourselves to covering ONLY the failing and dying parts of retail. We have covered many thriving properties to date, many of which are hit videos in our vast library of places we've visited. Obviously, we also try to get to as many dead and dying properties as we can, before they disappear, as many of the properties we've covered are either no longer open to the public, or, sadly, have been leveled to the ground in the name of "progress". We cover retail, as it is, where it is. What you see is what you get. And we like it that way, and have found that the majority of our viewers appreciate that approach as well. We try to refrain from editorializing, but sometimes it is necessary to address glaring issues.
Generally speaking, however, we show a walkthrough of a mall, set to fantastic music, that lets the viewer enjoy the property in the way one would if they were seeing the place in person. We have a tag team approach to our processs; my husband does the filming and I take the photographs we feature in the slideshow at the end of our presentations. I also do the social media end, via promotion and sharing of photos in advance of video releases.
I have been encouraged by many friends to begin a blog to share my writings, which people have been enjoying in the Facebook groups in which I participate, and photos of the places we've been. 2020 has been a challenging year on so many fronts, and the extra time I have had to both write and reflect on our journey, has created the perfect situation for me to spread my wings and do more to tell the stories of retail, our journeys to cover it, and generally to share those reflections of being half of Raw & Real Retail. This blog will serve as a means to dig a little deeper, tell a more detailed story, and generally be a companion to our YouTube presence. We hope our love for what we do shines though in every video we produce. We opted early on not to monetize, so as to not compromise the artistic integrity of our product, so we don't make a cent from any of it. This began as a pure labor of love, and we continue that tradition, as we prepare to celebrate two years on YouTube!
THANK YOU FOR WATCHING... and thank you for reading this, if you made it to the end of this post. A special thanks to everyone who has encouraged us along the way, and to our viewers and those who value our content enough to subscribe. Our sub count may be modest right now, but our fan base is dedicated and solid. And for that, we're appreciative!
Excellent encapsulation of this wild ride!
ReplyDeleteAll the big red hearts for you! <3
DeleteFantastic introduction and welcome to the blogosphere!
ReplyDeleteThank you for reading, and thanks for the warm welcome!
DeleteAmazing. Just amazing.
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