Klarinet Archive - Posting 000058.txt from 2000/06

From: "Benjamin Maas" <benmaas@-----.com>
Subj: RE: [kl] Does On-line Music make any money?
Date: Fri, 2 Jun 2000 15:59:31 -0400

>
> What struck me as interesting is the fact that CD's cost @-----.00
> to produce
> and are being sold for $17.00 a pop. Perhaps that is why people
> are turning
> to online music...Thanks Ben for your comments.
>
> Patty Smith

I goofed a bit when I said this... The manufacturing cost of the actual
disc is about a dollar. For classical music, the actual total cost can be
quite high. This is why labels are dumping classical artists, esp.
orchestras right and left. If you think about what it costs to hire an
orchestra, the costs are huge. Also the recording, post production, etc...
should be factored in.

For Classical/Orchestral music (some *very* rough numbers so you can see):

80 musicians = $600/each (a couple days of doubles here in LA)- $50,000+
Hall rental: $2000

recording engineers/producers: $5,000.
Editing: $3000
Mastering: $3000

5,000 Discs: $6000
Graphic Design/printing: $4000

Total: $75,000+

CDs are sold to retailers for about $13.00/each. So to break even, you need
to hope for at least 6,000 CDs sold. The average classical release sells
about 3000-4000.

Now for popular music, the musician costs are less, but the recording costs
are much higher. The high-end pop studios cost $500-$1000/day. It may take
2 months in the studio to record and mix down the music. Here's the thing,
though. Big popular acts have been known to go gold in the first week of
release. That is 500,000 discs sold. When you spread those fixed costs for
graphics, post production, etc... over 500,000 rather than 5,000, it ends up
costing much less per disc.

That big pop disc you bought might have only cost $1.50 to make, but that
classical disc cost a lot more. That is where my figure for the costs of
discs came from.

--Ben

Benjamin Maas
Fifth Circle Audio
Los Angeles, CA
benmaas@-----.com
http://www.fifthcircle.com

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