The Dailys opened Cactus Records in 1975. Daily sold the store to Bud and Don in 1959. He moved into the record business in 1946, opening Daily's Record Ranch, a store that sold records for under $1. The elder Daily left an accounting job with Southern Pacific railroad in 1933 and opened a downtown store on Travis, selling coin-operated jukeboxes. The end of Cactus Music & Video closes a chapter in Houston's music history that began with the Daily brothers' father, H.W. Bishop started circulating a letter this week to vendors and other business ties that announces the closing. The store also has less inventory to move after the holidays than at other times of the year. If all we have is the Best Buys of the world, then we don't have much control there." A part of historyĬactus' closing is timed to the end of the business quarter. "Cactus closing is a big deal if other retailers won't put (a band's) product out.
"The place has personality and a lot of artists work there as a hub," says Calvin Stanley, lead singer of Pale, one of the many local bands that stocked its CDs in the store. "The places where people can congregate to talk about and listen to music are disappearing quickly."Īrtists were a big part of that community. "Music is such a part of people's lives and we have created such a community here," says Quinn Bishop, the store's general manager for the past 20 years. Though electronic distribution of music looks to be the industry's future, some music fans will always prefer a centralized brick-and-mortar destination. The sad reality for fans of independent retail stores - those that offer eclectic and local titles and host in-store performances by artists - is that few investors are interested in picking up the reins in this kind of business climate. Meanwhile, digital music distribution has spiked: More than 350 million songs were sold digitally last year. CD sales nationwide fell 21 percent in 2005 from the year before. But the poor state of the music business might explain why the Daily brothers have been unable to find a buyer for the beloved store.
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