Japanese Labels Reissue CD’s In LP Like Sleeves

Leave it to the Japanese to find an interesting new way to market music to aging baby boomers nostalgic for the vinyl and those cardboard covers that folks used to wear out reading over and over again while the record played.

In what is dubbed as the "paper sleeve campaign", Japanese labels are re-issuing the likes of Elvis and Bruce Springsteen as CD’s packaged in colorful cardboard sleeves.  Often packaged as boxed sets, they give consumers yet another reason to buy the same piece of music again (vinyl), again (cassette), again (DVD), again (DVD plus, Dual Disc or enhanced CD) and again (paper sleeve CD). 

Appealing to the boomer marketplace (77 million and 27.5% of the marketplace according to The Met Life Mature market Institute) is something that US labels seem to do only as an afterthought.  This generation, who has more money than time, still buys CD’s and is learning about legal downloads even as the teens continue to steal tracks online and trade copies with friends.