{"id":122584,"date":"2013-12-06T00:57:39","date_gmt":"2013-12-06T07:57:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/westerns-rule-the-video-screen\/"},"modified":"2013-12-06T00:57:39","modified_gmt":"2013-12-06T07:57:39","slug":"westerns-rule-the-video-screen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/westerns-rule-the-video-screen\/","title":{"rendered":"Westerns rule the video screen"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Sam
Sam Green\/Cortez Journal<br><br>Jaime Martinez stands guard over some 8,000 flicks at Valley Video, a surviving mom-and-pop movie rental business in Mancos.<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cA lot of people here don\u2019t have satellite or cable television,\u201d said Bill Stogsdill. \u201cI saw an opportunity, and we\u2019re still here today.\u201d<\/p>\n

About 15 years ago, Stogsdill decided to take an early retirement as a Chicago glassblower, and he relocated his family to Mancos. In 2001, without any background in the home entertainment business, he and his wife, Juanita, opened Valley Video at 515 Grand Ave. Today, the mom-and-pop operation boasts a catalogue of some 8,000 flicks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have the largest movie selection around,\u201d proclaimed stepson Jaime Martinez from behind the counter. \u201cWe can match up against anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

With video on demand, the American audience is changing, evidenced by the recent collapse of Blockbuster.<\/p>\n

But Valley Video has been impacted \u201conly slightly,\u201d Stogsdill said. He attributes the longevity of the business to customer service.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe do what we can to keep people happy,\u201d he said. \u201cPlus, our customers are pretty loyal. Some of them we\u2019ve had since the day we opened.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fact that Valley Video rental prices have remained unchained probably helps too. Since opening nearly 12 years ago, the Stogsdill\u2019s have maintained $3 rental fees for new releases. Older titles are available for $2.<\/p>\n

Valley Video offers a variety of genres, from foreign titles to horror flicks, but the vast majority of customers prefer old Westerns, said Stogsdill. It also offers a wide selection of children\u2019s cartoons, action, drama, war and sci-fi movies.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur best-sellers are the old classics with John Wayne and Gary Cooper,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have several thousand movies from the \u201940s and \u201950s.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we don\u2019t have what you want, we can order it,\u201d added Martinez.<\/p>\n

The family owns the store\u2019s collection of movies. Stogsdill said, eliminating rents from a third party.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just don\u2019t want to have to mess with anybody else,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

While the movie industry tackles its changing market, Stogsdill said it\u2019s not much of a concern for him.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re just trying to hang in there until I\u2019m old enough to retire in two or three years,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear if Martinez will take over the business at that time. The 38-year-old has written some screenplays, and he dreams of one day jumping from behind the counter to the creative side of the silver screen.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe one day,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Valley Video operates from noon to 8 p.m. Sunday-Thursday and noon to 9 p.m. on Friday and Saturday.<\/p>\n

tbaker@cortezjournal.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Green\/Cortez Journal<br><br>Jaime Martinez stands guard over some 8,000 flicks at Valley Video, a surviving mom-and-pop movie rental business in Mancos.du1-i-syn \u201cA lot of people here don\u2019t have satellite or cable television,\u201d said Bill Stogsdill. \u201cI saw an opportunity, and we\u2019re still here today.\u201d About 15 years ago, Stogsdill decided to take an early retirement […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":122585,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6363],"tags":[431,13,275,83,1107,337],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-122584","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ds-news","tag-business-general","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-internet","tag-mancos","tag-movies","tag-television"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=122584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/122585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122584"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=122584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}