by Alex Lloyd Gross
Back in the day,when Marijuana was illegal and people could not walk into a store and buy CBD and Gummies , a 19 year old kid from the Northeast wanted to do something with his life. He was not sure what. He was a music instrument manager at Sam Goody, (a now defunct record store in the Roosevelt Mall). His name was Brent Brookstein. The store would get catalogues of paraphernalia such as bongs, papers and other assorted novelties. Due to the conservative nature of store ownership, that type of merchandise was never sold there.
Brookstein had a plan. His parents lived over a small store on Cottman Avenue and the current tenant was moving out. He convinced his parents to let him open a shop there to sell the kind of stuff that Sam Goody would not. “It was a perfect alignment of the stars. I took my Bar Mitzvah money and started this.”. It would be called “Artifax” To say Brookstein was a success would be an understatement. He had four stores, South Street, University of Penn Campus and State College area. All in addition to the Cottman Avenue location.
He has been in business for almost 50 years. It was not all easy going. In 1981 He was arrested by an egregious officer at the Roosevelt Mall when he asked the officer for his name and badge number. “The cop, on horseback would harass and bother my customers. I was a young kid then, with long hair and just wanted him to stop. He sued the city over the arrest and won. “They offered me a settlement. Either I take money or they would give me a license to sell this type of merchandise. “They only gave out two licenses and that became a monopoly. The license actually says bongs and papers on it,” Brookstein said.
That was in 1981. He was not arrested or raided again. Until what he called corrupt cops raided his store and destroyed merchandise. in 2006. “I was in Colorado when it happened. The cops did not care about any license, my employees got arrested and we sued and we won”, Brookstein said. “I gave the money to my staff who got arrested”,
Speaking to him, he is very laid back. He had three very longtime employees, Mindy Flood, who has been there 41 years Elise Guim who has been there 10 years and Larry Dresnin who also has a lot of time there. “It’s a small happy family,” Brookstein said and his employees agree with him.
At 67 years old, Brookstein is no longer a long haired kid who opened Artifax. The business has changed. Now CBD is everywhere, you can get papers and pipes at privately owned convenience stores. Years ago, he had to turn away customers that came in to buy “bongs” or “rolling papers”. It was for drug use and that was not allowed. “It was contentious at times, telling a customer who wanted a bong to leave,” Dresnin said. Had that customer come in for a tobacco pipe, things would have been different..
It’s time to close. The store survived for almost 50 years.Ironically, the push to legalize marijuana is what hurt his business. When he was the only game in town, he was king of the hill. The store survived two police raids and a car that plowed through the store on April of 2018. Now everything in the store is on sale. They sell cigars, safes figurines and of course merchandise that made them famous for almost 50 years. Wednesday , March 6 2024 will be the last day , Brookstein said.