About us

Ethos

According to Goldmine, which provides a grading scale for vinyl buyers and sellers:

A vinyl record grading Mint should be absolutely perfect in every regard. The record has certainly never been played, and could still be sealed in its original shrinkwrapping. To these enthusiasts, the very act of opening (or, even worse, removing) the shrinkwrap immediately reduces a record to Near Mint, although even that is no guarantee of a pristine piece of plastic emerging into the daylight.

The ethos of Mint and Sealed is to provide pristine, collectable, classic and future classic vinyl records, which are mint, sealed and unplayed, in all their exquisite glory. Usually these are sealed at manufacture, sometimes the record labels or distributors provide them with no shrinkwrap, or in an open PVC sleeve.

Mint and Sealed also handpicks a selection of the best new music releases and pre-orders on vinyl, providing a minty fresh selection so that everything you can shop for is all killer, no filler.

History

John Peel and the Festive 50, mixtapes, the Top 40, my first gig in South Wales (Big Black in Newport Centre), saving my school lunch money to go to Spillers Records instead, bugging DJs in the Square Club, Toucan Club and around Cardiff for the B52s or Jackson Sisters - these were my formative years, shaping my music taste.

After years of DJing and writing music reviews for Buzz Magazine, I went vinyl crazy in lockdown and bought far too much.

I started selling online with Discogs, and still keep that store going with restocks, recent releases, second hand vinyl and rare collectables there. From then, I sold to friends, and at South Wales vinyl fairs with Valleys Record Fairs and Vinyl Daze and also ran my own pop-up shops at Corp Market in Cardiff and Newport Market.

This new online shop started in October 2024 and my aim is to have a permanent bricks and mortar space too.

I pick the best of many genres and most of it is vinyl, new or nearly new. A cassette, CD or some other merch may occasionally slip in there too.

My fave genres are indie, afrobeat and hip hop, and top artists are MF Doom, Shabazz Palaces, Olivia Rodrigo, Fela Kuti, Mildlife, Matthew Halsall, Laura Veirs, Wilco, King Gizzard, Oh Sees, Prince Jammy, Kraftwerk and a whole heap more. 

The shop reflects my tastes and those of Mint and Sealed customers. You won't find all releases here, but hopefully you'll find a nice fresh selection.

Buy vinyl records with confidence, from Mint and Sealed, a vinyl record shop in South Wales.