Selling Prog on the Net - The Good, The Bad and the Ugly
jazzis kirjoitti noin 21 vuotta sitten (4 kommenttia)
The Palasokeri editor (Jake) approached me to write some articles in English for his wonderful Web site – how can I refuse…? However, my writing about Progressive Rock – the music, the musicians, the labels, the fans and the phenomenon - is often controversial and sarcastic and always very personal! Be warned, oh ye who enter…
My personal experience with the music business goes back almost 35 years, quite a stretch of time in any respect. It spans many aspects of the industry as my life evolved around music one way or another, first as a journalist and critic, later as a writer, broadcaster, label executive, producer, organizer, label owner and most recently owner of a Web based CD shop called Jazzis Web Shop ( http://www.jazzis.com/shop/
).
I’d like to share some experiences with the readers about my latest venture and even more importantly rise a few questions, which hopefully could lead to some form of discussion and exchange of opinions, which of course could take place on the forum available on this site.
The Jazzis Web Shop is a relative latecomer on the Prog CDs Web market. I launched the site about 18 months ago and by that time there were quite a few well know and established Prog Web vendors already present on the Net, such as Record Heaven, Musea, Laser Edge, Kinesis, Wayside and quite a few others. Being a latecomer has of course it’s advantages and disadvantages: I had the benefit of experience by studying what all the others were doing and therefore the possibility to assimilate their accomplishments and avoid their shortcomings.
Being a professional software developer (the other side of my dichotomous life), I decided to create the entire site by myself, thus having the benefit of complete control of it’s performance and the ability to maintain, change and polish it at will. And of course I haven’t stopped to tinker with it since day one, apparently a professional sickness.
I tried to stick to two basic objectives, when creating the site:
1.To include as many useful features as possible, some of which are not available on any other site of this kind (multiple search capabilities, dynamic color schemes, dynamic currency values, extensive help and even a forum for the shop’s customers).
2. To make the site as user friendly as possible and equally important as fast as possible.
Judging by the reaction of the shop’s customers, both objectives were successfully achieved.
Then of curse, any Web site selling CDs is only as good as the music items it offers for sale, i.e. the selection of titles, and by the service and prices it provides. I must say I tried to tackle both aspects on equal footing:
The Jazzis Web Shop now offers 850 titles, mostly Prog and some Jazz. 850 is not many in comparison to some other sites (more about this later), but considering the fact that these were selected on quality basis, it is nevertheless a vast body of wonderful music. Quality is very much subjective of course, but the canon of what constitutes good Prog is pretty well established by now.
As to service and prices – well both the items’ prices and the shipping costs I have are lower then any other Web site I know about (the disbelieves are welcome to compare). Judging by the facts stated above one would assume that the Jazzis Web Shop should be a raving success. Unfortunately the truth is far from being that rosy. It’s true that I managed to build up a solid base of loyal customers all over the world (including Finland), but the overall volume of sales is disappointing and certainly far from the existing potential. This fact prompts me to rise a number of questions in order to try and understand / analyze the phenomenon.
We’re all aware of the fact that the global Prog scene is very limited, tiny in fact in comparison to almost any other music genre. Nevertheless even the most conservative estimates state that the global number of Prog fans is at least 100,000 – 200,000 strong. Therefore, considering that Prog fans are usually avid CD buyers, the total market is potentially quite significant. And if so, where the hell are those potential customers?
After some research into this matter I found out with amazement that most Prog CDs bought on the Web are bought from the huge and well-established CD Web vendors, such as Amazon, CD Now, Barnes & Nobles, etc. Now this really pisses me off terribly!
Considering the abuse Prog suffered from the Majors of the music industry (The BIG music companies), it seems that the Prog fans learned absolutely nothing from the history. In my (not so humble) opinion, buying CDs from these huge conglomerates is exactly the same as supporting the Majors, which means that the small Independents get screwed again!
Throughout the entire history of Rock music (Prog included) the Majors had and always will have only one goal – to maximize their profits. All Majors are part of huge multi-national Corporations and the last thing on their minds is the music. For them it’s just a product, something that can be sold at a maximum profit and thrown away when it stops selling.
We, the Prog Community (if such thing exists at all?) ought to know better, but apparently we don’t. We forget that if not for the small Independents, we won’t have any Prog at all, should we leave the matter to the Majors. So can anybody please explain to me why on earth would a Prog fan buy a CD from Amazon when there are several small Independent Prog vendors struggling to keep on, Jazzis Web Shop included?
Of course I realize that due to my personal involvement in the matter, my views are subjective (but what views aren’t?). If you have a different view, please let us all hear what you think! See you on the forum.
In the meantime remember to support the Independents!
Adam Baruch
February 27, 2003
My personal experience with the music business goes back almost 35 years, quite a stretch of time in any respect. It spans many aspects of the industry as my life evolved around music one way or another, first as a journalist and critic, later as a writer, broadcaster, label executive, producer, organizer, label owner and most recently owner of a Web based CD shop called Jazzis Web Shop ( http://www.jazzis.com/shop/
).
I’d like to share some experiences with the readers about my latest venture and even more importantly rise a few questions, which hopefully could lead to some form of discussion and exchange of opinions, which of course could take place on the forum available on this site.
The Jazzis Web Shop is a relative latecomer on the Prog CDs Web market. I launched the site about 18 months ago and by that time there were quite a few well know and established Prog Web vendors already present on the Net, such as Record Heaven, Musea, Laser Edge, Kinesis, Wayside and quite a few others. Being a latecomer has of course it’s advantages and disadvantages: I had the benefit of experience by studying what all the others were doing and therefore the possibility to assimilate their accomplishments and avoid their shortcomings.
Being a professional software developer (the other side of my dichotomous life), I decided to create the entire site by myself, thus having the benefit of complete control of it’s performance and the ability to maintain, change and polish it at will. And of course I haven’t stopped to tinker with it since day one, apparently a professional sickness.
I tried to stick to two basic objectives, when creating the site:
1.To include as many useful features as possible, some of which are not available on any other site of this kind (multiple search capabilities, dynamic color schemes, dynamic currency values, extensive help and even a forum for the shop’s customers).
2. To make the site as user friendly as possible and equally important as fast as possible.
Judging by the reaction of the shop’s customers, both objectives were successfully achieved.
Then of curse, any Web site selling CDs is only as good as the music items it offers for sale, i.e. the selection of titles, and by the service and prices it provides. I must say I tried to tackle both aspects on equal footing:
The Jazzis Web Shop now offers 850 titles, mostly Prog and some Jazz. 850 is not many in comparison to some other sites (more about this later), but considering the fact that these were selected on quality basis, it is nevertheless a vast body of wonderful music. Quality is very much subjective of course, but the canon of what constitutes good Prog is pretty well established by now.
As to service and prices – well both the items’ prices and the shipping costs I have are lower then any other Web site I know about (the disbelieves are welcome to compare). Judging by the facts stated above one would assume that the Jazzis Web Shop should be a raving success. Unfortunately the truth is far from being that rosy. It’s true that I managed to build up a solid base of loyal customers all over the world (including Finland), but the overall volume of sales is disappointing and certainly far from the existing potential. This fact prompts me to rise a number of questions in order to try and understand / analyze the phenomenon.
We’re all aware of the fact that the global Prog scene is very limited, tiny in fact in comparison to almost any other music genre. Nevertheless even the most conservative estimates state that the global number of Prog fans is at least 100,000 – 200,000 strong. Therefore, considering that Prog fans are usually avid CD buyers, the total market is potentially quite significant. And if so, where the hell are those potential customers?
After some research into this matter I found out with amazement that most Prog CDs bought on the Web are bought from the huge and well-established CD Web vendors, such as Amazon, CD Now, Barnes & Nobles, etc. Now this really pisses me off terribly!
Considering the abuse Prog suffered from the Majors of the music industry (The BIG music companies), it seems that the Prog fans learned absolutely nothing from the history. In my (not so humble) opinion, buying CDs from these huge conglomerates is exactly the same as supporting the Majors, which means that the small Independents get screwed again!
Throughout the entire history of Rock music (Prog included) the Majors had and always will have only one goal – to maximize their profits. All Majors are part of huge multi-national Corporations and the last thing on their minds is the music. For them it’s just a product, something that can be sold at a maximum profit and thrown away when it stops selling.
We, the Prog Community (if such thing exists at all?) ought to know better, but apparently we don’t. We forget that if not for the small Independents, we won’t have any Prog at all, should we leave the matter to the Majors. So can anybody please explain to me why on earth would a Prog fan buy a CD from Amazon when there are several small Independent Prog vendors struggling to keep on, Jazzis Web Shop included?
Of course I realize that due to my personal involvement in the matter, my views are subjective (but what views aren’t?). If you have a different view, please let us all hear what you think! See you on the forum.
In the meantime remember to support the Independents!
Adam Baruch
February 27, 2003
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I have to admit to buying a few prog CDs from Amazon-CD Now, only 3 at most! It was in my rush in the late 90s to get up to date on prog. All this came about after I managed to interview Jim from Wigwam.
Nearly all my Finnish prog comes from Kane in Turku, Helsinki shops, Digelius or Doug Larson. It only comes to mind a few times a year to order such items on line. Mostly I shop local stores in person. Zappa I get from zappa.com, a cottage industry.
It is very nice that there is a shop that sells only good music! And I would love to support your webshop, but I don't have a credit card :(
Perhaps living in the USA gives you another perspective, where you CAN buy your Prog CDs in local shops (although I doubt that they carry After Crying or Isildurs Bane), but for most people in Europe, especially those in smaller towns this is NOT the case.
Havinh no credit card is NO excuse! :-)
You can send cash - many of our customers do so.
Happy shopping?