Elson,
That's just a little too simplistic. The production costs of a CD are maybe
$1.35 but that doesn't take into account artist royalties (and therefore
advances), recording costs (not including mastering which can is part of
$1.35 or so), mechanical royalties, promotion & marketing, label overhead
and admin costs and many other little assorted bills. And keep in mind the
usual cost of a CD to a distributor (in other words what the label charges)
is between $6.50 on the low end and about $8.00 on the very high end. The
money between that and what you at the store goes to distributors (and their
costs) and a much bigger slice to the retailer (and their costs). If labels
were to sell to you direct with no middlemen needed the cost could come down
to $7-8 tomorrow...
FYI: I am not pro label, pro artist, pro major, or pro indie (I may be pro
distributor, but that's because I like being able to eat and pay my rent
:). I'm just pro good music. Period.
Dirk van den Heuvel (dirkv@groovedis.com)
Groove Distribution
http://www.groovedis.com
Your Guide To The Underground
-----Original Message-----
From: Elson Trinidad [mailto:elson@westworld.com]
Sent: Friday, June 16, 2000 11:51 AM
To: angedella isafella
Cc: acid-jazz@ucsd.edu
Subject: Re: Labels
angedella isafella wrote:
>
> Dear list: I heard that labels rarely ever lose on a cd.
Oh obviously. It costs like, what, $1.35 to produce a CD at cost, and they
sell
for $13-$18 retail?
Plus, record companies who had albums pay for themselves many times over as
LPs
(i.e. any Beatles album, Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon," "Eagles'
Gretest
Hits" etc get even more profit as releasing them as CDs (and even more when
they
put out "limited edition digitally remastered" versions).
- 30 -
:. elson trinidad, los angeles, california, usa
:. elson@westworld.com
:. www.westworld.com/~elson
[ the futurethnic beats of e:trinity - www.e-trinity.org ]
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