Brooklyn video store draws new fans as DVDs and VHS make comeback

A young customer walking into Night Owl Video in Williamsburg to buy a VHS tape for a VCR at home captures the shift unfolding inside the shop. The Brooklyn store, which opened in April 2025, has become what its owners describe as the only full-service video store in New York City, drawing movie fans who want to browse shelves, make discoveries and own what they watch.

Night Owl Video carries about 1,500 unique titles across VHS, DVD and other physical formats, mixing classics with newer releases. Co-owner Aaron Hamel said he and his partner Jess Mills opened the store after growing tired of waiting for someone else to bring back the kind of place where people could linger, talk movies and get recommendations face to face. That in-person exchange, once central to neighborhood video stores, has become part of the store’s appeal as more viewers grow wary of streaming libraries that can change without warning.

The response was immediate. The soft opening drew about 550 people in five hours, and customers have continued to come in steadily to browse. Prices start at about $5 and climb to more than $100 for rare VHS tapes, giving the shop a range that appeals both to casual buyers and collectors. Horror fans have been especially active, helping drive demand for tapes that are as much display pieces as they are playback formats.

Night Owl’s draw is not just nostalgia. It is also a reaction against algorithmic culture, where recommendation engines decide too much of what people see and where access can disappear when a title is removed from a platform. At the store, the search itself becomes the point. Shoppers sift through cases, ask questions, and leave with movies they did not know they were looking for.

The comeback has spilled beyond one storefront. The NYC Tape Fair launched in 2025 in Bushwick and drew more than 1,000 people in six hours. Its 2026 edition returned with more than a dozen vendors selling VHS tapes, cassettes and other physical media, underscoring how a once-declining format has turned into a social gathering point again. Night Owl Video now sits at the center of that revival, part retail counter, part community archive, and part rebuke to the idea that culture should live only inside an app.