Hunley: Business hopes to find way around recession

The past few weeks have brought no smoother a road for the guys at Trakside.

Two months ago, I wrote about how the NASCAR collectibles store in Woodbridge was holding a “Save Our Store (or going out of business)” sale.

It seemed a good idea from the father-and-son duo of John and Jeff Fisher, an honest but ingenious way of fighting the recession.

The co-owners literally offered customers and would-be customers a win-win: You get a deal, and maybe we stay open.

But they didn’t make it. At month’s end, when their lease is up at the Prince William Square strip mall, they’ll pack up their wares and begin selling online only at www.trakside.com.

It’s the stock-car equivalent of making it most of the way through a race and then having your engine blow up. You can continue to compete, but you’ve suffered a severe setback.

On the upside, operating from Jeff Fisher’s apartment in Dumfries will greatly lessen expenses, John Fisher said.

“The rent and utilities are a killer” in the current space, he said.

On the other hand, the change means that the Fishers will lose all walk-up business, all sales from people who happen upon them, say, when, like me, they’re going for a sandwich at Subway or for pizza at Padrino’s.

The family has owned Trakside since August 2003, and they used to bring in gross sales of upward of $35,000 a month.

But that figure dropped to as low as $8,000. Some customers who spent several hundred dollars per month on Dale Jr. replica cars or Tony Stewart T-shirts have completely cut racing from their budgets.
Really bad days meant the Fishers might sell only a hundred bucks’ worth of merchandise.

Even an English major like me can understand that that’s not a prescription for a healthy business.

However, an idealist like me also could hope that the “Save Our Store” sale, advertised as it was on Trakside’s windows, might actually, well, save the store.

I asked John Fisher on Friday if maybe Trakside could dot-come it for a while, and then reopen a brick-and-mortar version later.

“I would like to do that,” he told me, “but probably not, because I don’t see the expense side going down.”

Ironically, the Fishers said business had kind of picked up since they made their sad decision.

One new customer said, “I’m glad I found you.”

Here’s to hoping he’s got a lot of friends.

And that they all have high-speed Internet access.

Jonathan Hunley is a staff writer at the News & Messenger. Contact him at 703-369-5738 or at jhunley@insidenova.com.