Re: [ARSCLIST] Is The Record Shop Dead?

["Steven C. Barr(x)" <stevenc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Steven Smolian" <smolians@xxxxxxxxx>
> Since discounting was allowed in the late 1940s in the U.S., new records 
> were always sold on a short mark-up.  The bucks used to be there for those 
> who could buy trainloads, run sales on items bought well below wholesale, 
> buy fresh stock, and sell it cheaply with enough left over to pay for the 
> carload when that was due.
> 
> Dealers used to make more on cut-outs than new stuff.
> 
> I've been on all sides of this counter and concluded long ago that, with 
> small capital, the only way to make money in the retail end of the business 
> was to buy and sell used records. The antique mall model with unattended 
> booths worked well for a while but you needed more than one location. 
> Driving time was lost time.  As gas went up and the CD cycled in, that too 
> became unprofitable.  The CD was also a lot more theft-prone.
> 
> With eBay, it is no longer necessary to carry bricks an mortar overhead- no 
> emplyee, no need to be there all day, etc.  There's world-wide distribution, 
> not just the ten local collectors who already had what they collected from 
> your stock.
> 
> Things don't get better or worse, they evolve.  So must we all.
> 
Well, when I find my solderin' (NOT shootin'!) iron, and get my "78 deck"
up, running, and connected to my sound card...I could, in theory (and,
actually entirely legally here in Canada...) copy any of my half-vast
shellac holdings...by individual request or by my assumptions as to
what might interest potential clients/customers...singly or in "sets"
to CD-R's!

Next question...how many other collectors are also thinking of a similar
approach?! We can assume there exist about three million indiviual 78's
(although that probably includes a lot of duplication, since I have seen
sides from the twenties that appeared on as many as twenty different labels!),
or six million sides.

One indeed wonders what portion of our total recorded history no longer
exists (the last copy having been broken or discarded)...? We usually try
to keep track of various "rarities"...but, given the vast number of sides
1ssued 1945-59 (like my "Okie" disc...!) as well as the records no one has
ever bothered to collect (Henry Burr doing hymns, for example...) how many
discs no longer exist at all...?!

So...first, we create the applicable discography (E78EFM*...?!)...and then
we assemble the applicable sound recording archive...!

Steven C. Barr
(* As a variation of Lennick's "EFREM"...!)