While she grew up playing guitar and violin, it was the 11 years she spent working at record stores that really gave her the idea to open a shop.

After briefly quitting the record business, Frarey worked as a dental assistant in Lansing.

She suffered severe injuries from a motorcycle accident and was forced to quit her job in dentistry.

The accident led her to consider new career options. She thought going back to her record store roots would be the best fit.

On Jan. 2, 2008, The Record Lounge held its grand opening.

Frarey said she is a big supporter of keeping vinyl alive and spoke highly of the listening experience.

“Once you buy a record you can hear everything,” Frarey said. “You can hear all the instruments, you can hear every little thing in that record, even all of its little flaws, you know, and I think that’s what gives it its character. I think that’s why people love it.”

Frarey said she has seen a boom in record sales lately and hopes this growing popularity will last for at least 10-20 years.

Frarey runs the shop with respect and the desire to help as priorities.

“She’s the nicest person you will ever meet,” Ryan Horky, an employee at The Record Lounge, said. “There’s no one nicer than Heather.”

While many record stores give off the vibe that employees are know-it-alls and speak to customers with an air of cockiness, Horky said Frarey strives for the opposite.

“Heather, and by extension this store, is not like that,” Horky said. “If someone comes in and is like, ‘I’m just getting into records, can you help out?’ She’s like the first person to want to help and to be nice and to respect other people’s music tastes instead of being an elitist jerk.”

From giving music recommendations, to dropping what she’s doing to sit and chat about music, Frarey makes it a priority to get to know her customers.

Though she grew up listening to classic rock, she also has an appreciation for the new indie artists.

She said the hardest question one can ask her is to choose her all time favorite artist.

“Music makes the world go ‘round honestly,” Frarey said.

People associate certain songs with specific moments and events in their lives, Frarey said. It’s always comforting to hear that song and to go back to that moment.

“It can cheer people up, it can bring people down, but it’s just always there and something people can always turn to,” Frarey said.

The Record Lounge will be hosting a “pop-up shop” at the Union on March 17 and 18, and a band called Sister Helen from Brooklyn, New York, will be performing in the store on April 23.