Today we’d like to introduce you to Bryson Nelson.
Hi Bryson, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I was a full-time touring musician for 7-9 years. My dream however was always to be a studio drummer. When I moved from Southern California to Nashville Tennessee, I was newly engaged and was looking to pull back from the touring life. My shop was very organically grown, I wasn’t really pushing for a drum shop necessarily. I started inviting friends to come to play on drum products I was flipping from my house and which slowly sparked into a shop.
I was buying and selling vintage drums for years on the road but never really thought I’d do anything past that with it. When I did jump into retail, my love for the community and for having a place for others to enjoy and meet friends was immensely fulfilling to me. That passion grew more and more. My love was always for people and the shop sorta followed behind that into a community space for everybody and anybody to enjoy.
I just loved having a place that people could feel accepted, meet friends, and be part of a family through these doors. That to me is why I’m willing to put in countless working hours and your business owner’s everyday stresses. That’s why I do what I do. The drums are just the vehicle (a vehicle I know and love) but very secondary to the joy I find within the community.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
I do feel fortunate in the sense that we’ve had very sturdy growth. Fortunate because I’m really not much of the brand pushy pursuer or ‘how fast can you grow your business’ type of guy. This drum community has been so dang kind and encouraging to us – that’s fed my energy to keep going. There’s definitely been extremely stressful seasons, hard transitions, too many moving pieces, and the feeling like you are always 10,000 steps behind.
We also are always having to adapt to the wind – this is my own need to feel unique, special, or different. However, we’ve definitely seen a large share of companies kinda carbon copy what makes us unique – that’s an ongoing battle for any artist, however. People do this all the time and there’s nothing wrong with it. I am hyper-fixated on wanting to feel unique and innovative; thus, it’s a lot of changing with the seasons. We’ve also run across a great deal of shops/companies putting tall effort into trying to steal or harm what we’ve built.
I don’t thrive in competition, I don’t have that build. I wanna be everybody’s friend and find some common ground for friendship. Thus, sometimes I get a little discouraged by how common this business practice is. We’ve definitely seen a lot. However, when I sit back and think about it… It’s been consistently sturdy. That I am very thankful. More than anything, I’m grateful that people feel at home here and wanna continue to be part of it with us.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
My name is Bryson Nelson. I am the owner of a Vintage and Classic Drum Shop called Nelson Drum Shop. We are known for our unique aesthetic, our drum finds, and most importantly – a community spot for people to make friends and feel inspired by each other.
My role has changed immensely from when I started six years ago. I use to do 150% of any and everything. Whether it was running the storefront, helping customers, packaging and shipping drums, cleaning the bathrooms, scouting drums, fostering vendor relationships, running rentals across town, getting back to emails phone calls, running social media, creating films, and photography content, etc. Before budget allowed, the more the shop grew – I would just adapt into whatever role needed me.
I definitely put in the hours and the sleepless nights like any business owner learning to adapt would. However, six years later, I have six employees that help around the clock. I have a full-time manager that is absolutely incredible, Lemuel Hayes, and he tends to run most of the daily grind at this point. In recent years, my job title has shifted more into event planning, creative development, creating an environment for people to enjoy and ways to welcome the community around it, and general overseeing.
I don’t feel like anyone person in our shop adds more value than another, however. My employees feel more like family and we all work really hard together. They are incredible and we all get to help and inspire each other.
How do you think about luck?
I don’t know if I necessarily believe in luck or not. I think there’s proper timing, who you maybe meet or know, and chance. We work very hard, all the time. However, I think because our focus wasn’t just a ‘drum shop’, it felt unique and special to me.
With this, I wanted to share that with the world in hopes it potentially could bring some type of joy to someone else’s life. Thus, the stars kinda just aligned for this thing, in this time, with the right community – so I guess this might just be luck with a mix of hard work, timing, and really kind support from our community.
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Website: www.nelsondrumshop.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/nelson_drum_shop
- Facebook: facebook.com/nelsondrumshop
