house concerts and 21st century touring

Choosing the primary format of your music sales is about knowing your audience.

If you are playing for teenagers (colleges, clubs) that question is much more important than if you are playing house concerts. House concerts will define your audience by an older (sweeter?) demographic of people who have been conditioned to buy discs of artists they love. Though they may rip those songs for their iPods, most still have a nostalgic feeling toward the CD and it’s accompanying story, lyrics, and artwork.

If you are playing regularly, a thousand CDs is not that much to sell. I think it’s wise to do limited releases (200 units or less) with new product when your career is in transition or low-gear. But if you are playing music full-time, there’s much advantage to a commercial-grade release (cost per unit, time spent per unit.)

CD packaging with the big boys (discmakers, oasis) recently took a nice price dive. There are now several attractive packages with a unit cost of $1. The resulting value of $10-15 (while it lasts) will help you recoup your recording/mastering investment much more quickly than any download system I know of.

Bottom line: A nice package still creates more value than it costs.

Fran Snyder
ConcertsInYourHome

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