KITCHEN –
The last exclusive video store in the Waterloo area will live on for another day.
Far out Flicks in Kitchener was due to close at the end of the month, but a new deal with the owner will keep the doors open for a while longer.
“There are still a lot of moviegoers and people who want to have copies,” said Rolf Glemser, who opened Far out Flicks in October 2002.
The video store is stacked from floor to ceiling with thousands of DVDs, VHS tapes, Blu-ray discs and a lot of nostalgia. Following the sale of the building to a new owner, Glemser said the store had to be vacated on December 30 before a new lease agreement could keep the business afloat.
“As you can see, we have so many things. I had nowhere to put them. So I called the new owner, ‘Look, can we rent for a year?’ And we made a new deal, so another year,” he explained. Gelmser.
Gelmser said the business is stable, accounting for about a dozen customers a day, with many trying to offset the challenges of streaming services.
“They will have a movie for a few years and then it will be out of circulation, so if you fall in love with a movie or TV series they have, it may just no longer exist,” Gelmser said. “Plus, with our rentals, if Amazon says it’s $ 10, we’ll sell it to you for five.”
Some clients, such as Nick Isaac, prefer to have a physical copy of their favorite movie from streaming any day.
“I’ve probably already brought in over a thousand movies,” said Isaac, who has become so regular that he volunteers at the store in exchange for a discount. “It’s very awesome, I’m glad he did it so much because I do not know where I would make movies.”
Glemser said he looks forward to the rest of the year and to meet other true movie buffs like him.
“It’s almost like a new beginning, a renaissance, so to speak,” Glemser said.
