
Robert Oliver is still trying to sell the downtown Little Rock home of RAO Video, which he has owned since 2001.
After 43 years as Main Street’s video man, Robert Oliver is still renting and selling movies at RAO Video, but you may have heard he’s selling out, seeking $1.2 million — or perhaps a little less — for his three-story 18,400-SF building downtown.
Oliver, who announced in March that the building was up for sale and that all the merchandise within was on discount, told Whispers last week that potential buyers are touring the 609 Main St. property almost weekly, but he hasn’t yet had a firm offer.
“We stopped the selloff [of videos and other merchandise] till we get an offer,” said Oliver, who told Arkansas Business months ago he was envisioning a Florida retirement as a millionaire. Now he says there’s some flexibility in his price for the building, which he bought for $120,000 in 2001 and listed originally for $1.3 million.
“I’ll take offers for less, but FYI, this is one of the only properties in Arkansas that’s reasonably sure not to lose value,” he said, citing its location on Main Street and its involvement in the Little Rock Downtown Partnership.
Decades before streaming video, Oliver and RAO staked a claim as the nation’s first video store — though there’s competition for that title — and he’s been a firsthand witness to the rise and fall of video sales and rentals. But there’s still a living to be made despite the diminished business, he said.
“If I weren’t 81 years old, I wouldn’t think about selling,” Oliver said. But he has been working 71 years, starting as a 10-year-old picker in Arkansas’ cotton fields. Sometimes at midday he’d lie on his cotton sack, resting “and praying for death,” he said. “That’s enough” work for a lifetime, he said.