{"id":47736,"date":"2019-10-09T23:01:02","date_gmt":"2019-10-10T06:01:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/?p=47736"},"modified":"2019-10-09T23:01:03","modified_gmt":"2019-10-10T06:01:03","slug":"no-vinyl-records-arent-outselling-cds-do-the-math","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/2019\/10\/no-vinyl-records-arent-outselling-cds-do-the-math\/","title":{"rendered":"No, Vinyl Records Aren’t Outselling CDs – Do the Math"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Last month news spread that, \u201cVinyl Is Poised to Outsell CDs For the First Time Since 1986,\u201d as Rolling Stone reported<\/a>. The source of that prediction is the recording industry\u2019s own mid-year report<\/a>, which showed vinyl sales racking up $224.1 million on 8.6 million units in the first half of 2019, creeping up on CD\u2019s $247.9 million on 18.6 million units.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You don\u2019t have to stare at those numbers long to notice one disparity is significantly bigger than the other. It\u2019s true that vinyl records accounted for only $23.8 million fewer than CDs. But the units moved tell another story. In fact, more than twice as many CDs were sold than vinyl records \u2013 116% to be more precise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don\u2019t know about you, but that looks to me like vinyl records are still a long way towards outselling CDs. Rather, each of those records sold generated more revenue than each CD, $26.06 per record vs. $13.32 per CD.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those numbers should look pretty accurate for anyone who\u2019s bought new music lately. Whereas in 1989, when the CD was ascendant and a new record generally cost at least a few bucks less, the situation has reversed in the intervening three decades. And that makes sense if you account for the industrial history at work here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As vinyl sales dropped in the 90s in favor of digital discs, companies pressed fewer records, and pressing plants gradually shut down. While CD sales have slowed in the last decade, they haven\u2019t yet experienced the kind of drop-off that vinyl did. Although the last ten years have seen a vinyl resurgence, aging plants struggled to keep up with demand, and new plants came on line, all increasing costs. CDs, on the other hand, became a mature technology, with production costs having pretty much bottomed out in the early 2000s, and not having increased much since then.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At core, this disparity is due to the fact that vinyl now costs more to manufacture than CDs. On top of that, I suspect that demand and the popular perception of records as a more premium product conspire to help push and keep prices higher.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, it isn\u2019t really the case that vinyl is outselling CDs. \u201cOutselling<\/a>\u201d means that something is exceeding something else in volume of sales. Instead it\u2019s the case that vinyl is outearning and generating more revenue than CDs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Based upon those per-unit revenue numbers, if vinyl were actually proportionally on pace to outsell CDs in volume sold, they\u2019d be generating more like $438 million on about 16.8 units.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Picking Apart False Narratives<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Why do all this nit-picky math? Because I think a false narrative is being spun here. It\u2019s the narrative that CDs are dying at such fast pace that even a once-thought-obsolete technology like the vinyl record is going to surpass it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I care because it\u2019s the same kind of narrative that\u2019s been used to smear radio for the last generation or so. This, despite the fact that some 90% of the population still listens to terrestrial radio.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, I\u2019m not a luddite (which seems like a strange thing to call someone who\u2019s defending the digital compact disc). I don\u2019t dispute the fact that radio listenership and CD sales are declining. Given the ubiquity these technologies enjoyed in the year 2000, pretty much the only way to go was down, especially with the proliferation of new, often more convenient and diverse technologies. But that slide does not mean the technologies are dead or obsolete.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have a particularly sore spot for FAIL culture and tech triumphalism, which go looking for receding tech or trends to pronounce ready for the trash heap of history. The pernicious aspect of this is that it causes some folks to think maybe they\u2019re backwards or out of it for continuing to enjoy their CDs or radios.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For CDs specifically, what I see happening is people dumping their perfectly good collections, ones that were often painstakingly acquired and curated, and at great expense. I get that streaming is more convenient; I listen to more streaming music than CDs. But even if I\u2019ve pared down the collection, I\u2019m not going to just chuck away favorite albums like that. You never know when Spotify is going to lose the rights to your beloved music out of nowhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

History Repeating Itself<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m having flashbacks to the early 90s, when I knew so many people dumping their vinyl collections \u2013 often for free or very little money \u2013 in favor of rebuying many of the exact same albums on new, supposedly superior, shiny digital discs. Being both a poor student then, and also vinyl enthusiast, I scooped up dozens of great albums for a fraction of what they originally cost or even what they go for now, new or used.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve definitely talked to other Gen Xers who admit to now rebuying yet again favorite old albums on vinyl reissue, that they once had on CDs that replaced their original vinyl copies. Oy, the revolving door!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Look, if you\u2019re into downsizing and Marie Kondo-ing your music collection, I have no beef with that. Streaming Spotify takes up significantly less space than any CD or vinyl collection. As long as you understand that some albums may mysteriously disappear from your streaming playlist and are fine with that, then forewarned is forearmed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But dumping CDs because there\u2019s a popular misconception that they\u2019re inferior or obsolete, that\u2019s what doesn\u2019t make sense to me. Especially since decent CD players are easier to get and less expensive than all but the flimsiest record players (never mind smartphones), not having a player shouldn\u2019t be your excuse. In fact you probably have a CD player and just haven\u2019t realized it \u2013 it\u2019s your DVD or Blu-Ray player.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

18.6 Million Is a Hell of a Niche<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I have no doubt that physical media will become increasingly less prominent and more niche. But still, 18.6 million CDs sold in 6 months (some 37 million in a year) is a hell of a niche!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even if most people stop buying new CDs altogether, there are still billions of discs on the used market, in flea markets, thrift shops, garage sales and free bins. In fact, the online music database and marketplace Discogs says CDs saw the biggest increase in sales<\/a> amongst all formats on its platform in the first half of the year. Unlike the RIAA\u2019s numbers, which only count new product sales, Discogs counts both new and used.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While vinyl records were the most popular physical music format on Discogs, keep in mind that the medium is twice as old as the compact disc. We should expect there are at least twice as many of them out there to be traded and resold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even so, nearly forty years of compact discs adds up to a nearly unfathomable amount of music out there to be heard. Moreover, a decent percentage of it was never released in another format, and still isn\u2019t available for streaming. That means there\u2019s a treasure trove of undiscovered or to-be-rediscovered nuggets out there for the finding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some of those treasures might be in your attic, basement, storage unit, or \u2013 even better \u2013 your CD shelf.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And, maybe I\u2019m not the only digital luddite. Only a couple of weeks after the \u201cvinyl is surpassing CD\u201d news, Billboard reported<\/a> that new compact discs from Taylor Swift, Tool and even Post Malone are flying off the shelves. This apparently is causing labels to reconsider their physical media strategy, as stores beg for more product to sell, especially of new hit albums.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Is a \u201cCD Store Day\u201d far behind?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Need more convincing? Earlier this year I outlined \u201c10 Reasons Why CDs Are Still Awesome (Especially for Radio)<\/a>\u201d and expanded on the topic on our podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last month news spread that, \u201cVinyl Is Poised to Outsell CDs For the First Time Since 1986,\u201d as Rolling Stone reported. The source of that prediction is the recording industry\u2019s own mid-year report, which showed vinyl sales racking up $224.1 million on 8.6 million units in the first half of 2019, creeping up on CD\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":47738,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,34,4090],"tags":[495,651,6068,4045,5059,2414,2444,2959],"class_list":["post-47736","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-electronics","category-music","category-op-ed","tag-cds","tag-compact-disc","tag-discogs","tag-featured","tag-music","tag-records","tag-riaa","tag-vinyl"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/Fisheye-CDs-2.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47736"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47736\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47739,"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47736\/revisions\/47739"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47738"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.radiosurvivor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}