Why are there no vinyl sales?

ewmy

Genre Addict
I've noticed HMV are having another sale, not the BIGGEST EVER this time but I'm sure there are still bargains aplenty as they bring out the £2.99 happy hardcore comps from the back room. I think they'll have sold out of this by the time I get there though.

I wonder this though - why is vinyl hardly ever in sales? I thought sales were basically opportunities to get rid of stock and make some room and surely this is equally valid for vinyl. Do record shops never over-order vinyl? (I find that hard to believe).

I know a lot of shops have "sale" boxes and bargain bins of 12s, but in whenever I look these are full of total tripe - pop-dance non-hits always seem to be over-represented in particular. And look at Juno's sale - there's some good stuff in it I'm sure, but they've only cut most of the prices by about a third. That's not a sale, it's a discount :D

I'm talking about full-on "everything must go" bargain madness, like the time when one of my favourite shops in Leicester decided to stop selling vinyl and sold their entire stock at £2 or less. What a weekend that was.

The question that logically follows from this is "What happens to all the unsold records?". Someone must be stocking up on cheap overstocks, and it's certainly not me.
 

outraygeous

Well-known member
all the un sold records end up in that basment that dj shadow visits in a film i got called scratch - a hip hop documentry
 

mms

sometimes
ewmy said:
I've noticed HMV are having another sale, not the BIGGEST EVER this time but I'm sure there are still bargains aplenty as they bring out the £2.99 happy hardcore comps from the back room. I think they'll have sold out of this by the time I get there though.

I wonder this though - why is vinyl hardly ever in sales? I thought sales were basically opportunities to get rid of stock and make some room and surely this is equally valid for vinyl. Do record shops never over-order vinyl? (I find that hard to believe).

I know a lot of shops have "sale" boxes and bargain bins of 12s, but in whenever I look these are full of total tripe - pop-dance non-hits always seem to be over-represented in particular. And look at Juno's sale - there's some good stuff in it I'm sure, but they've only cut most of the prices by about a third. That's not a sale, it's a discount :D

I'm talking about full-on "everything must go" bargain madness, like the time when one of my favourite shops in Leicester decided to stop selling vinyl and sold their entire stock at £2 or less. What a weekend that was.

The question that logically follows from this is "What happens to all the unsold records?". Someone must be stocking up on cheap overstocks, and it's certainly not me.


they get destroyed and people et their mcps returned if you have certificate of destruction
 

3underscore

Well-known member
I'll go for a few quick points

- retailers don't get the same deal on vinyl. CDs are geared drastically on sale (the buy one, get eight) and these are used for sales - a sale at HMV is a promo, make no mistake.

- Economics. Vinyl and CD offers a seperating equilibrium, and I would safely assume that your elasticity of demand on a price change on vinyl is inelastic. There is no potential to make money from a vinyl sale, so they just hold at full price.

- most the decent vinyl sale stock will be snapped up by the staff
 

gumdrops

Well-known member
is it just me or are HMV and more or less every high street chain having sales all year round? im surprised there are any months left in the year for them to do normal trading with all the sales they put on.
 

mms

sometimes
3underscore said:
I'll go for a few quick points

- retailers don't get the same deal on vinyl. CDs are geared drastically on sale (the buy one, get eight) and these are used for sales - a sale at HMV is a promo, make no mistake.

- Economics. Vinyl and CD offers a seperating equilibrium, and I would safely assume that your elasticity of demand on a price change on vinyl is inelastic. There is no potential to make money from a vinyl sale, so they just hold at full price.

- most the decent vinyl sale stock will be snapped up by the staff

well you can make money on vinyl if you sell alot - specialist vinyl does ok as it's always priced slightly higher, to get into the big chains you have to do several things - be willing to spend on advertising, be willing to take the risk of producing alot of stock to the chains order and risk returns if it doesn't sell and take less per unit on your sales, sales vinyl is usually stuff that no one wants but you might as well make the production costs back.
 
another one?

hmmmm there a few bits and bobs that are quite cheap now.....lemme look behind the couch for some spare change.......
 
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