Known throughout the world as the go-to store for rare vinyl, obscure CDs and hard-to-find merch, Amoeba Music started with one store in Berkeley, Calif., in 1990 and quickly grew to … well, three stores, with locations in San Francisco and Los Angeles in addition to the company’s East Bay starter city.

But don’t let the small number of outlets fool you. As chain retail music stores claw and scratch for every little bit of sales turf they can hold on to, Amoeba keeps building customer loyalty (and sales figures) the old-fashioned way – by keeping customers satisfied.

And that’s why the company’s first digital download promotion is newsworthy. When you have a company that prides itself on the personal touch and in-store atmosphere, the very idea that the same company is trying something as modern as digital downloads is pretty amazing.

But then, this is digital downloading the Amoeba way, which isn’t quite the same as buying from Napster, Amazon MP3 or iTunes.

Matter of fact, Amoeba’s first downloading venture isn’t even about buying at all. Instead, it’s about giving away free music in hopes that people will buy music.

Amoeba launched its own record label, Amoeba Records, in 2007 and is now on the verge of issuing its first two releases on the Amoeba imprint: Gram Parsons & The Flying Burrito Bros. Live At The Avalon Ballroom 1969 and Brandi Shearer’s upcoming album, Closer To Dark. To promote both releases, Amoeba is giving away free downloads from each album.

However, there is a catch. While the downloads are free, they are not archived, and there won’t be an opportunity to grab either album in its entirety in one single download. Instead, you gotta play along with Amoeba, which means going back to the company’s Web site every two weeks for the next round of freebies.

“If you don’t want to pay for the CD, you can get it this way and it’s legit,” Amoeba co-founder Dave Prinz told Pollstar. “So, over the course of 26 weeks you can get the first side for free and we don’t have any problem with that. We hope over that time maybe you’ll decide to buy the CD … But if you don’t buy anything, that’s cool too. It doesn’t really matter. At least we’re getting Gram out there to the world and letting people see how great a singer he really was without having to pay. And if they like him, they can pay.”

The first round of downloads featured Shearer doing a version of Parsons’ “Hickory Wind,” which was recorded during an Amoeba in-store appearance by the artist, and The Flying Burrito Bros. doing “Close Up The Honkey-Tonks.” As the promotion started during the holiday season, you could also snag a download of Shearer doing “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas.”

“This is sort of a midway point between what Radiohead did and … nothing,” Prinz said. “I can’t see doing what [Radiohead] did. You’re relying too much on the public to do the right thing.”

Along with enticing visitors to return to Amoeba’s Web site by making them come back every two weeks for more free downloads, the company / fledgling record label is also demonstrating its promotion acumen by bundling its up-and-coming artist with the legend that is Gram Parsons.

“Once upon a time, there was a girl singer who nobody had ever heard of and nobody would have ever heard of if Gram hadn’t brought the public’s attention to her,” Prinz said. “And that girl was Emmylou Harris. If it wasn’t for Gram she never would have been heard. She was singing in the back room at the Cellar Door in Washington, D.C. And the front room wasn’t that big.

“In my heart, I’m hoping that Gram’s fans, through this promotion, can hear Gram for free, and hear Brandi, too, and say, ‘Wow! That girl can really sing!’ And from afar, from another place, Gram will help one more great girl singer be heard.”

There is an Amoeba download store in the company’s grand plan. But because Amoeba doesn’t quite operate like most record stores, it’s a sure bet its download store will be somewhat different from the current breed of online music services.

“Hopefully, it will be just like your experience going into the store,” Prinz said. “You’ll go to an artist you like, or some genre you like, and find something you didn’t know existed, and go ‘Wow! I need that!’

“Our download site will be the kind of site where you’ll have that same kind of experience. ‘Oh, look! There’s a really cool picture sleeve I can download. Or The Beatles singing ‘I Wanna Hold Your Hand’ in Italian!’ Just crazy stuff that you can’t get anywhere else.”

With no announced beta testing or even a tentative launch date, Prinz indicated that an Amoeba Music download store will be ready when it’s ready, and not a moment sooner. Kind of like those old Orson Welles TV ads from 30 years back where the entertainment legend boasted that a certain winery would “sell no wine before its time.” Meanwhile, Prinz and the Amoeba staff continue to nurture that small-store image known around the world.

“Almost every day in L.A. a tour bus pulls up in front of our store and … Japanese kids come into our store. In the course of a year that’s like, maybe, 7,000 kids, right? In seven years that’s 50,000 Japanese kids coming into our store,” Prinz said.

“So, we’re not unknown. Around the world a lot of people do know us. To really experience [Amoeba], you have to come to the store. Maybe we can create a little bit of that online for everybody else. There’s really no in-between for us. Either we do a great online site or we don’t do anything. We’re working on it. Hopefully, it will be ready – one of these days.”