Archive for February, 2009

Filed under: News, RIAA, IFPI, BPI

I’m always enlightened when Glenn Coolfer grabs his calculator and starts making sense of the sales figures Billboard and Nielsen throw around. Often you find that when Coolfer works over the numbers he gleans insight that no one else is spouting.

This week is no different. While the nay-sayers are forecasting the demise of the music business (once again), Coolfer shows us that optimisim may be the better track, “Last week, digital track sales totaled over 21 million, a 29% drop from the previous week but still 61% higher than the same week in 2006. That 29% drop was an improvement over last year’s 33% decline. In other words, sales are higher and are not dropping off the holiday peak as quickly as last year.”

He’s talking about the same week in which the Dreamgirls Soundtrack was the best thing going, which slipped into the top spot while only moving 66k copies. Its the same week Paul Resnikoff used to declare, “Album sales continue to drop year after year, and chart-topping releases are losing their sales potency. the continued declines are generating anxiety among investors.”

Patience and prudence Grasshopper. I say 2007 will end up a banner year, and the year we’ll all look back on as the point when a solid transition was made from physical to digital. No doubt, it’ll be a bit painful for some. Transition is never comfortable, nor should it be expected to be.

See also:
US Album sales slow during 07’s first week
Fergie pops digital sales record, fails to credit humps

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Filed under: News, Apple, Creative, Microsoft, Sandisk

Those early Zune sales numbers are slipping into less-than-average territory, having dropped to 5th overall behind Apple, Creative, Sandisk and even also-ran Memorex.

Bloomeberg reports, “Zune’s market share declined as SanDisk Corp. boosted sales with a 50 percent price cut on its media players, taking a 39.3 percent share and knocking Microsoft from the No. 2 spot it occupied in its first week in the market. Redmond, Washington- based Microsoft sold about the same number of units as the previous week, failing to keep pace with rising holiday sales.”

All in all it appears as if the Zune will find its way under far fewer Christmas trees than Microsoft had once hoped. Microsoft’s PR machine is still hopeful however, predicting 1 million units sold by mid 2007 in recent reports.

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