Vintage and vinyl reign in Salisbury antique shop
Sue and Bill Hetherington call their new establishment an "antique store," and that it is. Their wares are generally older, no longer available new and purchased at auction or from the previous owner.
Otherwise, Whistling Swan Antiques, which opened in January, doesn't conform to the archetype. It is neither musty nor cluttered, dusty nor darkly lit.
"Our daughter said this place looks like our house," Sue recalled.
The 1,200-square-foot space in the College Avenue Shoppes in Salisbury presents a blend of two categories of vintage objects: things the Hetheringtons are confident will sell well and things that proceed from their shared passions.
The most notable example of the "sell well" category is the shop's collection of 1,200 vinyl records, highlighting 1970s-era rock music.
"We try to stay with the trends," Bill said. "It's a huge trend now people are buying records and record players again."
Sales of new vinyl records have increased every year for the past decade, peaking at nearly 12 million last year, according to Nielsen. Their vintage brethren are popular as well, particularly among teenagers and 20-somethings, Bill said.
The couple has found it's best to buy records from the original owners. Those bought at auction or flea markets tend to be in poorer condition. If a customer wants to test the condition of a record before buying it, the store has a working record player behind the cash register for just that purpose.
The store joins Seasons Best Antiques in downtown Salisbury as the only shops on the Lower Shore with sizable second-hand record collections for sale.
The Hetheringtons also expect big things from other finds such as their vintage Barbie dolls, glass thimbles, fishing lures, Mason jars and costume jewelry.
"People collect about anything," Bill said.
Reflecting their own interests, they also carry wildfowl decoys and paintings depicting iconic Chesapeake Bay scenes. Bill is an avid duck and goose hunter and also has been known to carve decoys of his own.
For Bill, in particular, opening the store was just the latest step in a progression that began with selling refurbished furniture for extra spending money back in high school. A consummate craftsman, he kept working on restoring furniture even as he rose through the ranks at Perdue Farms, retiring a few years ago as the head of its philanthropic arm, the Arthur W. Perdue Foundation.
He and Sue met in 1979 at James Madison University in Virginia and married the following year. She went into mortgage banking, working for a succession of financial institutions on the Lower Shore. They have two grown children and two grandchildren.
Together, they have scoured auctions, flea markets and family estate sales across the mid-Atlantic and upper South. At first, it was just for themselves. But a few years ago, they started renting booths at antique stores. They still have space at Town Center Antiques in Berlin, in fact.
Coolest Small Town also land of antiques
But that wasn't offering enough personal involvement. For them, each piece has a story, and they want to share that story with potential buyers.
Take the antique cash register that sits not far from its modern, digital counterpart. The ornate, bronze-colored machine was built by the National Cash Register Co. in 1910 and was used in a shop in Crisfield — they're not sure which one.
The people who made it "took a huge amount of pride in this obviously," Sue said.
When Bill opened it to clean it and replace the broken keys, he found a trove of old business cards. Some were so old, the phone numbers listed on them had only two digits.
The store is named after the melodious species of swans that frequent Schumaker Pond on the east side of Salisbury near their former home; they now live in Allen.
Their goals are modest for their store. They want to make enough money to stay open and maybe bring in more stock.
"It's not hard to make a little money," Bill said, "but it's not in the cards to make a lot of money."
Contact reporter Jeremy Cox at 410-845-4630 or on Twitter @Jeremy_Cox.