Music Business

Vinyl Prices Hit Unbelievable Highs

1The price of vinyl  is continuing to soar, with many new records costing upwards of $40. Used vinyl prices are also hitting unbelievable highs. Here we look at some of the most expensive releases sold in 2017.

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Guest post by Bobby Owsinski of Music 3.0

The price of new vinyl albums is going through the roof these days and some industry execs think that we’re fast approaching buyer fatigue as a result. While you might find a few at $16, it’s not uncommon to see a premium release go for anywhere from $40 to $60, which can strain most collector’s pocketbooks. That said, used vinyl is still selling at astronomical prices as well. According to Discogs, Here are the top 10 most expensive pieces sold last year.

Most expensive items sold on Discogs

The downside of this is the fact that the artist sees none of the money from the used market, since it’s already been sold once (and in the case of The Beatles demo, never sold at all). Even so, there’s a healthy royalty coming from a $40 sale of a brand new premium vinyl album. The problem is that you don’t sell very many of them, since the total vinyl market only makes up around 3% of the total recorded music revenue stream.

The point is that the vinyl market continues to grow, but it’s slowed down in the last year or so and is still only a very small part of the music business. 

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1 Comment

  1. So is this overall a financial positive or negative for musicians?
    Seems like those outrageous amounts paid for vintage vinyl could help a lot of musicians…instead it’s just being paid back and forth to speculative collectors.

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