Charleston vinyl shop teams up with Philadelphia Eagles for charity

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) - When the Philadelphia Eagles management team contacted Record Stop, a downtown Charleston business, to create a limited-edition vinyl of holiday music, it was an opportunity the business could simply not resist.

In late October, the concept of “A Philly Special Christmas,” a vinyl starring Jason Kelce, Jordan Mailata and Lane Johnson of the Eagles, was brought to Record Stop after the group was turned down from other vinyl manufacturers.

Starting as a family business, Record Stop also owns Monostereo Vinyl, which is a record label and vinyl manufacturing division. Record Stop Owner Mike Gomez and Marketing Director Eric Nail say it typically takes from six months to a year to produce a project of this size, but the duo was determined to drop the first release before the holidays.

“The ‘Philly Special Christmas’ team came to us and said they had the audio and the artwork, so they’re like, ‘can you get it done? We have no way of getting it to the fans,’” Gomez says. “We were able to utilize our internal team to basically get it to all the fans, which is close to 30,000 records.”

The overall goal of the project was not just to create a collection of Holiday tunes celebrating Philadelphia, friendship and Christmas, according to the group’s website, but mainly to raise money for charity.

The album ended up raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for the Children’s Crisis Treatment Center, that delivers behavioral health services to Philadelphia’s children and their families.

Sales began before Black Friday but did not start shipping until the middle of December. Gomez says after the first release, they realized that resale vinyl records were being sold on eBay for up to $1,000, which defeated the entire purpose of raising money for charity.

Because of the high demand, they decided to open sales up for as many people as possible, knowing the records might not ship out until late January or February. After selling out three times, the record is now off the market.

“The first day that we posted the thing, and it went live for sale, we were a little nervous, like, ‘are they gonna show up?’ By the time it was going to go live at 9 a.m., there was 10,000 people just waiting to press the button online,” Nail says. “That was kind of incredible.”

As of last week, “A Philly Special Christmas” is sitting third on the Billboard Vinyl Albums chart, and first on the Compilation Albums chart.

“We’re a family-owned operation; so, to be able to do that, and to have the amount of traffic that came through our website, and then also be able to get it to the fans has been really incredible,” Gomez says. “The fans have been in touch with us, you know, obviously looking for the record, but also being so grateful; and with the season that the Eagles have had this year, it’s just another thing that’s been just absolutely amazing to watch happen.”

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