Blogcritics: Comments on It's ABOUT Time

Comment by Robert Hollowood

Fri, 31 Oct 2003 18:52:29 EST

Problem: Wholesale costs are down for UMG tiles, but the new Sting album, which was the first title in the program, is marked at 18.99 in many stores I've been in. The stores aren't jump-starting sales on titles that come from UMG. In fact, I believe they're using the savings they're seeing from UMG to offer the new titles, regardless of label, each week at 9.99. Bad policy for the stores. Short-term gain. Long term, I see UMG eliminating the policy.

Comment by Mark Saleski

Thu, 4 Sep 2003 13:15:59 EDT

i think that tom is right. this whole thing may be a moot point for kids. on the other hand, people in the older ages groups may well end up buying more cds. i bet i will.

Comment by Tom Johnson

Thu, 4 Sep 2003 12:29:40 EDT

What I'm curious to see is if this will actually counteract the damage that's already been done. The youth of today have practically been brought up to download and don't really seem to have any qualms about never having artwork, credits, liner notes, etc. This seems totally foreign to me, as I generally immerse myself in a new release when I get it, reading throught liner and poring over the artwork. Kids don't really seem to care, and don't even care about "albums" as a form of music delivery at all. It will be interesting to see if kids respond - $10 is a lot more than "free" when you don't care about anything you're being asked to pay for.

Comment by Johno

Thu, 4 Sep 2003 12:13:16 EDT

As I noted over at my crappy weblog, they should have done this YEARS ago. Ask any sales rep actually out selling CDs to stores, and they will tell you that $10 is the magic number. You can sell ANYTHING for ten bucks. I'm a sucker for the bargain bin-- if I get worked up, I'll pay $9.99 for an album with ONE good song! And I ain't alone. For new releases, the magic number is in fact about $13 as stated in the article-- UMG has gotten it right by putting it at $12. If only they had the brains to go down to $11.99, they'd be working magic. Now, the question really is, after they pay the exorbitant price & positioning costs and ad rates, will they still make money at $12? If all the labels do this, this could be the start of big, big changes in how retailers and labels do business, and not a moment too soon.