The rising cost of new Vinyl

Clearly the kids decided free was the best value

 

So vinyl has seen price escalation because streaming revenue is hit/miss?

 

No, because CD (and download) revenue is down so much.

 

Cost of entry is mid 6 figures and it's 24 hour business that is not for the faint of heart. Only this year have new machines been made for the first time in 35+ years. Mothballed pressing machines from South America and Africa sell for 25k, probably cost thousands more to ship back to the US and still need to be brought back up to working condition which only a couple people in the world.

There's also silly facts like only a couple people left in the work that supply the raw vinyl or can make lathe machines.

When you see "behind the scenes" clips of plants it's sometimes shocking how beat up the machines look.

 

Greed.
I hear the hedge fund managers, stock market traders, and brokerage houses
are all getting out of high finance and opening record pressing plants.
Michael Douglas will be starring in the next film, VinylStreet. #sarcasm

 

In Pono We Trust

 

Ain't singing for Pepsi ain't singing for coke......

 

There already have been new record pressing facilities opening up. Eventhough current pressing facilities are very busy, most could all use some more business.

 

Isn't everyone already at capacity, even the new ones that are up and running?

 

I don't know about the States, but in Europe not only are turnaround times getting longer and longer, but plants ARE turning away business, I've talked to a few people this year who have struggled to get records pressed, basically if you haven't got history with the plant or some sort of muscle such as a distributor behind you then you will wait a long time or even get turned away, I'm planning to have our RSD 2016 release in the queue by next month, hopefully that will be enough time.

 

People like Juliana Hatfield and Veruca Salt have vinyl come out 6 months after the CD. One of the biggest breakthru album this year, Courtney Barnett was back ordered on vinyl for quite a few months. Noel gallagher vinyl was MIA after the first run quickly sold out.

The first 3 months of 2015 were locked up at the plants getting all the RSD vinyl done which is easily 400,000 - 500,000+ pieces of vinyl. And they are not simple 7 or 12 inch black vinyl orders.

 

Having been in retailing for most of my life, yes, I fully understand the concept of doing business. Your mark-up is to cover overhead(the cost of doing business) and the profit you expect to make. I would think that most record stores don't mark new common records up 100%, giving them a 50% margin($15. to $30). Their only sales would be to people who didn't know any better. Used records, on the other hand, some store owners tell me that they mark them up 500%, giving them room to deal while still making a profit. Also what I found out was that I bought the latest re-issues of Beatles, Stone and Led Zeppelin vinyl LP's for less through PopMarket(Sony) than the record stores paid from their distributors. I could have sold my LZ albums for less than the stores paid and still made a profit.

I realize what makes up the retail price and that it is seldom paid. With the cost of making an album added to the small cost of manufacture, on a percentage mark-up, there is much larger profit margin. With the cost of production fixed, the only variable is the cost of manufacture based on the number of units and format.

So, here's a simple example: Say you want to buy both an LP and a CD of the same current album, both single disc with the same number of tracks, at Amazon, sometimes the CD might cost $10. and the LP $15. At these prices, the mark-up is obviously not based on percentage or an identical percentage on both formats. Even at $20. the mark-up percentage wouldn't be the same. But, what I am trying to get across, a CD might sell for $10. and the LP version might sell for $40. The wiser choice would be for the consumer to buy the CD. But, even with substantial differences in manufacturing cost of CD's and LP's, the higher cost of the LP just doesn't pencil out. Oh, yeh, as a bonus, Amazon also often gives you free mp3 downloads as do many LP's.
What it comes down to is more profit is being made with the sale of an LP compared to a CD.

 

Simple economics...supply and demand.

 

So they're being greedy, or not?

 

In the states, it's the same situation. I've noticed with the RSD and RSD Black Friday offerings, some of the records are coming from overseas eventhough they are from major U.S. record companies. Speaking with Steve at Rainbo Records the other day, they have added more employees and vinyl equipment plus more and longer working days.

 

It doesn't seem that they have raised their prices and they have re-invested their profits into more equipment plus adding more employees. Any new jobs are great in our current economy.

 

Boomers empowering them.

 

RSD has become a monster, it's really distorting everything, what gets pressed, what shops spend, probably what people spend, too many pointless releases, too much product from majors and too many titles that get a slightly different issue a few months later, I'm not sure what the solution is, but it does need to evolve.

 

RSD can say "no" to certain releases or have criteria that actually makes every release uniquely special in some way, and still special a year later. Colour/shaped vinyl should only be limited to 10% of all RSD titles.

 

For one, it's a 4 LP release.

And neither you nor I know what the associated costs are for each step of the manufacturing process for his records, including the fees for those people responsible for completing the archive work to do these releases.

I have no idea myself, but that's why I don't pretend that I know what it should cost. I simply decide if it's worth my money or not.

 

And then most of them end up in the remainder bin. Want last year's Animals 10" EPs? Saw 'em for $4 apiece at Newbury Comics last week.

 

Wtf?? Oh Neil......

 

You are correct. My point is that the Dylan set with a huge book is $20 or so cheaper than the 3 LP young set. To me the Dylan price is way more justified than the Young set. Just my opinion

 

As we can see above, it's clearly Trump's fault.

 

Just read an article about this today. If I remember right, vinyl revenue was roughly half of what CD revenue is. That is revenue. Think about that.
Considering vinyl is what, 2-3 times the cost of CDs, that adds up to far fewer units being sold.
And it would seem downloads is overtaking them both quite steadily.