by Ethan Holmes

Created on: March 10, 2009

The Profit War; Vinyl vs. CD

I remember the day in 1984 quite well. I walked in to my record supplier's store in downtown Orlando
on that particular day to update my steadily growing library of vinyl records. I was running one of the top mobile disc jockey companies in town at the time and one of the things I built my business reputation on was the wide range and selection of music I took with me to each and every gig. Things were about to change.

The proprietor proceeded to inform me that within two weeks the major record labels were simply going to cease shipment of vinyl and convert completely to compact disc. Now this was not good news for me since my equipment centered entirely around two Technic MK 1200 turntables which at the time cost a total of nearly $1000. I also had enough vinyl to take up two eight foot banquet tables.

"Why in the world are records going away?" I asked incredulously. The owner's reply was that the record companies were saying that CD's were going to be much cheaper and last much longer and were able to hold much more music. Only one of those statements turned out to be true, at least for the consumer.

Twenty five years later anyone with any intelligence now knows the only benefit as far as cheapness goes was to the record companies. Sure CD's were cheaper. They were cheaper to produce than vinyl and so was the packaging and shipping. For us on the retail and commercial buying end the CD turned out in many cases to be more expensive than any vinyl I ever bought and I'm not even factoring in the equipment changeover costs.

As for longevity, that turned out to be a bad joke played on us. We all know that unless you take meticulous care of the vaunted CD it can actually become completely unplayable or skip and stop in a player. A whole underground industry of CD repair solutions has grown out of the CD's propensity to be easily damaged and become unplayable.

The only statement that turned out to be true, yet for years was not taken advantage of by the major labels, was the disc's ability to hold more songs. Back then a vinyl album averaged between ten and twelve songs per album release. So did the record labels use the amazing new CD to give the consumer more music for their dollar? No, of course not; the albums were released just as they always had been. Only on occasion did a release claim to contain "bonus tracks" and then only two or three at most. The record companies were certainly not going to tell the artists that they had to start

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