Why you should join BMG...

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Last night I spent some time talking with Denise, my account manager at BMG.
I asked her for reasons why people in this group should join BMG Music Club.
She had two good ones.

First, even if you buy only a dozen CDs a year your net, delivered price
from BMG is substantially lower than what you'd pay at retail. (This assumes
BMG has recordings you want to buy, of course.)

Which brings us to the second point.

The market for classical recordings is declining. Denise emphasized that BMG
has a finite amount of storage space, and they don't want use that space for
recordings that don't sell. The more classical buyers BMG has, the greater
variety of titles they can stock. (You've probably noticed that the BMG
flyers aren't quite as thick as they used to be, and that's the reason --
not enough members.)

Denise told me that BMG has trouble attracting >good< customers -- the kind
that keep buying recordings after they've gotten past their "12 for 1"
offer. As classical listeners tend to be avid collectors, they're precisely
the kind of customer BMG would like to have.

I don't know how many serious classical collectors >aren't< BMG members. But
suppose a goodly chunk of them joined BMG and bought, oh, 50 CDs a year. We
might see a return to the days of thicker catalogs and a wider choice of
recordings.


Denise is trying to put me in touch with someone who >might< be interested
in reissuing the GPoC. But don't hold your collective breaths.

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spam
"William Sommerwerck" <gizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:boCdnTWpWZcuZZPeRVn-pA@comcast.com...
> Last night I spent some time talking with Denise, my account manager at
> BMG.
> I asked her for reasons why people in this group should join BMG Music
> Club.
> She had two good ones.
>
> First, even if you buy only a dozen CDs a year your net, delivered price
> from BMG is substantially lower than what you'd pay at retail. (This
> assumes
> BMG has recordings you want to buy, of course.)
>
> Which brings us to the second point.
>
> The market for classical recordings is declining. Denise emphasized that
> BMG
> has a finite amount of storage space, and they don't want use that space
> for
> recordings that don't sell. The more classical buyers BMG has, the greater
> variety of titles they can stock. (You've probably noticed that the BMG
> flyers aren't quite as thick as they used to be, and that's the reason --
> not enough members.)
>
> Denise told me that BMG has trouble attracting >good< customers -- the
> kind
> that keep buying recordings after they've gotten past their "12 for 1"
> offer. As classical listeners tend to be avid collectors, they're
> precisely
> the kind of customer BMG would like to have.
>
> I don't know how many serious classical collectors >aren't< BMG members.
> But
> suppose a goodly chunk of them joined BMG and bought, oh, 50 CDs a year.
> We
> might see a return to the days of thicker catalogs and a wider choice of
> recordings.
>
>
> Denise is trying to put me in touch with someone who >might< be interested
> in reissuing the GPoC. But don't hold your collective breaths.
>
>

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Tim Martin wrote:

> Here's a question for her: do recording artists get royalties on CDs sold
> through BMG?

Why would or how could any specific retail channel void contractural
royalty obligations?

--
ha

Archived from groups: rec.audio.pro (More info?)

I thought record club sales were considered a promotional expense that
was billed to the artist. Not a sale that they were paid royalty for.
Can anyone confirm this??

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> hank alrich <walkinay@thegrid.net> wrote:
> >
> >Why would or how could any specific retail channel void contractural
> >royalty obligations?
>
In article <dendeu$pqc$1@panix2.panix.com>,
kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) wrote:

> Because SOME labels have different royalty rates for record club sales
> in their standard contracts.

Yep, it's right in the contracts. No royalties for record club
giveaways, 50 per cent royalties for units sold through record clubs.

Which is why music from some artists is not available through record
clubs.

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Alas, you're wrong. It's not spam. Promotion, yes, but not spam.

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> Why would or how could any specific retail channel void contractural
> royalty obligations?

It shouldn't, but what if record-club sales were treated as a "promotional"
distribution? I'm not saying it is, I don't know.

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"hank alrich" <walkinay@thegrid.net> wrote in message
news:1h1w6u3.1ra6h5b1pylrhzN%walkinay@thegrid.net...
>
> Why would or how could any specific retail channel void contractural
> royalty obligations?

A recording contract might pay the artist 10-15% of the wholesale price of
90% of sales.

So if a CD sells 100,000 copies, the record company can make another 10,000
and sell them to record clubs for any price they like. Anything they get
more than the manufacturing cost is extra profit to them ... and the sales
will not wipe off any of the debt the artist owes the record company.

So with 100,000 sales, the artist can end up in debt to the record company
.... the artists $100,000 or so in royalties not covering the advances used
for recording, mixing, mastering, video and other costs, while the record
company nets say half a million dollars ...

Tim



Tim

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"William Sommerwerck" <gizzledgeezer@comcast.net> wrote in message
newsLWdnVsnWIjqBJLeRVn-qw@comcast.com...
>> Here's a question for her: do recording artists get royalties on CDs
>> sold
>> through BMG?
>
> Good question. I'd guess "little or none", especially for $2 CDs, but I
> honestly don't know. I'll ask her next week.
>
>
My understanding is that the artists agree to sell the albums available from
BMG and collect smaller than normal royalties.