Arroyo Grande Welcomes Video Rental Shop in a Digital Age

Gone are the days of the big box movie rental stores, with many people now streaming online. But that hasn’t stopped two women from opening up a family video store in the five cities area.

‘Way Back Video’ in Arroyo Grande opened its doors in November of 2014.

The co-owners agreed on that name, because it takes a lot of people “way back,” to the days people strolled down the aisles and rented.

Several customers renting movies on Monday said nostalgia drew them in.

“I have cable, and Netflix, but I never find any of the older movies but there is so much more variety at a movie store,” said Carol Keller, a regular at the movie store.

The co-owners said some people tell them they haven’t realized what they’ve had until its gone.

Sara Montgomery, co-owner of ‘Way Back Video,’ said she and her business partner took a big risk opening up a movie store. Montgomery said, “We put in everything that we had and we went for it.”

It’s working out. On Monday, Michael king, an Arroyo Grande resident just signed up.

King said, “We saw it was open, we were renting out of the red box and we said, why don’t we go in like we used to go in and rent a movie.”

Their clientele has grown considerably since opening up the store. “What makes us want to do this more is we’re making people happy they love coming in here,” said Montgomery. She added that her goal is to carry everything people want in all genres.

When asked if anyone told them if opening a store in the digital age is a crazy idea, Montgomery said, “Everybody told us this is a crazy idea. When we first opened the store we had a lot of people come in here and say you guys are never going to make it.” She added, “people said you’re crazy. That’s obviously always tough to hear but we said yeah right, watch us make it watch us do it.”