More Indie Reaction To Tower Bankruptcy & Retail Woes

Part 2 Of A Series: Our friends at world music publicity firm Rock Paper Scissors polled some heads of indie labels on the recent Tower bankruptcy, other cutbacks in the retail sector, and the future of the CD for their blog DubMC. Here is the second installment in the series –

Eric Smith, Label Partner of indie reggae label Easy Star: Tower’s troubles are a big blow for us.  In the past they were a good source for steady sales and a place where we could run affordable retail programs. I always felt that their buyers understood the reggae market, and for a downtown New York label it was significant that they had the stand alone world music store on Lafayette Street. For our latest release last month, their order represented nearly 10% of our initial ship, but we had to pull the order due to their problems. Who knows if we will make up those lost sales somewhere else.

Harold Hagopian owner of World Music label Traditional Crossroads: The CD is not dead. I estimate five to ten years before downloads become the main format for consumers. I doubt that Tower is dead either, but some serious reorganization will most likely keep it viable for some time. I predict they will downsize to 50 or less flagship stores for now and in the future they will become more of a cafe/download facility. Most of the large chains have started buying product through a central office and made local "world music buyers" section managers. I’m not surprised by Virgin doing the same. It is true that retailers have downsized world music sections, which makes it harder to reach the general music buying public. Serious world music fans though hear about new releases through radio or world music magazines and find a way to buy them.

Read Part I in this series with Putamayo’s Dan Storper here.