Hello Everyone,

Last Saturday marked our second RSD event and I am happy to say it was another successful event for our stores. I think the only downside for most were the allocations and cut orders on a few titles where there was just a lot more demand from the stores and their customers than supply (I am looking at you Fleetwood Mac). From the numbers I have gotten reports on, after RSD Drop #2 the stores were on average at about 76% of RSD 2019 sales which is great news!

This week I have included a few of the wrap-ups from our stores:

Twist and Shout
Record Store Day Drop #2 - September 26, 2020 at Twist and Shout
A little hard to describe this second RSD drop. Financially we did 88% of the August drop’s total with about half the number of titles. The customers still seemed pretty psyched. Our sell-through was strong. On the other hand, there was palpable exhaustion visible amongst the staff. The workload is similar, but the emotional payoff of the huge crowds and sense of event is lessened by the health and safety strictures we are forced to implement. This is nobody’s fault. This is the unprecedented time we are living through. Everyone’s exhausted by something right now. Hard to complain.
I remain grateful to the labels and RSD for making this happen - it is overall helpful and heartening. Doing something special for record store employees - like a really cool exclusive shirt or 7” just for employees - would be a super nice gesture for someone to do. All these good people working for us are on the front lines of the music industry, putting the best face on the bands, formats and experience of being in a physical record store. (Maybe advance copies of the Tool LP - Ha!)
The Allman Brothers were our big winner this time - but I’ll bet we could have sold 10 times as many Biggie if we’d had them. Customers really seem to dig the controlled nature of our system - unless they get a late time slot, then attrition starts picking up. But that’s really the nature of RSD - the stuff is limited and as we all know, there is no sales aphrodisiac like scarcity.
Thanks to everyone who helped make it happen.
Paul Epstein

Record Archive
An absolutely gorgeous day in Rochester NY- can you say 80 degrees in September?
The lines were about 100 people when we passed out our timed shopping tickets. ( 8:30 pass out)

1 Food Truck, 2 live bands, " Spin the Wheel" For fun prizes, local celeb DJ Dino Kay on the mic, as well as rocking the Bar were all part of the scene. We are far more organized
Noticeably quieter and may I say that there was not as much enthusiasm in this month's list. We also discussed (internally) that due to current NYS Guidelines we cannot
" promote live music performance- it must be incidental to the dining experience." SO....

Now the numbers:
Sell through 75%
Best Sellers:

The Wall
McCartney
Fleetwood Mac- wished we got more!! damn allocations
Britney Spears
Brandi Carlile
Doors
Garcia
Replacements
Primus

Not so highly coveted or shall we say I was thoroughly covered with: black crowes, hendrix, tove lo, rolling stones

Since this is so difficult to compare, I have looked at our first 2 drops combined and am happy to say we are at 81% of RSD 2019.
The Sept drop was slower than August, only about 70% of what we did. However, sell-through was great~
All good, forever grateful to all those who made this possible! THANK YOU~

The Long Ear
Overall very successful RSD drops. Sell through around 75%, which is excellent for us. We ordered more carefully this year when orders were due last March due to the virus, so pleased with the results. Although sales were down a bit, profits were up. Customers had a great time & observed our safety precautions. Looking forward to RSD#3.
Take care & thanks for all of your efforts on our behalf, Terry

Easy Street
Again, we did about ¼ the biz as we’d normally do on RSD, but with that being said, it went way better than anticipated. We’ve had a range of local problems, wildfires, protests, and our West Seattle Bridge is still closed off to the rest of the city.

Being here in Seattle, one of the original COVID epicenters, we are still only in Phase 2, so health and safety have to be our first priority. We didn’t encourage browsing and had some sections of the store closed off.

We did a lot of Instagram/social stories throughout the day. https://www.instagram.com/easystreetrecords/

We had 98% sell-through, no previous RSD had we ever been in 90% percentile. Our orders were pretty conservative though. We could’ve certainly used more McCartney, Bill Evans, Notorious BIG, Currensy, Allman Bros, Meat Puppets, Tegan & Sara, but we’re not in a position to be taking chances right now. Before anyone gets their bustle in a hedgerow, just know we ordered 3,000 copies of the Brandi Carlile title…we wish we could’ve gotten em all. A Brandi + Soundgarden RSD project is about as mouthwatering a title as we could ever imagine here in the NW, especially at this store. Brandi is coming off 3 Grammys and is absolutely adored here at Easy Street and throughout Seattle. Also, as some of you know, Chris Cornell and his family had lived a few blocks from Easy Street. We hosted release parties for every Soundgarden record over the years. Chris was the first person to ever sit at our coffee bar. He had a beer instead of a coffee… if u were curious. This title holds a very special place in our hearts and was recorded at our friend's studio, London Bridge.

We posted all remaining stock online at 7 pm after we closed. There’s really nothing left. Thank u Broadtime, it all worked out, whew.

Next month, we’ll see how Seattle is fairing health-wise and what the state regulations are, but for now, we’ll continue to fix up, paint, and remodel the store during all this craziness.

Appreciate you all inspiring us. We see you.

Music Millennium
Hello All -
It was an interesting day for RSD Drops 2. Our first person in line showed up about 8 pm Friday night. Same person who was our first person for RSD Drops 1. We had put some canopies out on the sidewalk early Friday evening due to the heavy rains all week. Luckily for all that came, the rain did not arrive during the night.

I arrived at 5:30 am Saturday and handed out time slots to those in line. It was surprising to only see 30 people in line, 40 less than RSD 1 at the same time. It took till 7 am before we had that other 40. We again let 30 people in every 30 minutes and managed to have 5 minutes to spare to do some cleaning and sanitizing of the counter, pens, etc. Everyone snaked through the store and walked by every release from RSD Drop 2 as well as what we had leftover from RSD 1. There were people who had not made it to RSD 1 and we sold a fair number of the leftovers. Last time we gave away time slot tickets up to 2 pm and we kept store to RSD shopping only. This time we only gave time slots till 11 am, 3 hours into the day.

We planned on opening the store to full shopping at 2 pm but made the decision to go back to a limit of 10 people in-store shopping shortly after 11 am. I think it really helped the day out but created lines outside of 15 to 30 most of the rest of the day till 7 pm. We stayed open to 10 pm, up from our COVID hours of closing at 7 pm. This week we will expand to staying open till 8 pm.

We did not hand out gift bags or our traditional coffee and muffins due to COVID. Everyone was happy just to be able to get a chance to pick up some if not all the coveted titles from this Drop. Though we normally have live music events, we did air a live stream at 3 pm with Arlo McKinley, the last artist John Prine signed to his Oh Boy label.

Our sell-through was just over 70% for the first day and I’m sure we will see that go up with today’s business over 75%. Very happy with that. Our business was about 37% of RSD 2019 and 88.5 % of RSD Drops 1. We were happy with that as we were hoping for at least doing 30% of RSD 2019, based on the
amount of titles we had.

Titles the did not perform well were from Nahko & The Medicine Show, Ellie Goulding, Rolling Stones, Group Love, Son Volt and Batman & Robin.

Thanks to all of you in the industry that made these releases and helped make RSD Drop 2 possible. We and our customers are looking forward to RSD Drop 3 on October 24th. Special thanks to Michael Kurtz, Carrie Colliton as well as Andrea Paschal and Eric Levin for all you do to make this happen… especially making well thought out decisions in changing the structure to RSD in the year of COVID.

Here are the top sellers for the Day:

Full-Length Vinyl
1- Replacements - Complete Inconcerated Live 35
2- Fleetwood Mac - Alternative Rumours 33 (allocated - sold out)
3- Bill Evans - Some Other Time: The Lost Sessions 30 (sold out)
4- Allman Brothers - Fillmore West 1-31-70   27
5- Doors - Soft Parade: Stripped 27
6- Paul McCartney - McCartney 25
7- Roger Waters - Wall: Live In Berlin 25 (sold out)
8- Let Fields - Let’s Get A Groove On 20 (sold out)
9- Wilcovered - Wilcovered 20 (allocated - sold out)
10- Primus - Suck On This 20
11- Mark Snow - The X Files: The Truth 20 (sold out)
12- Britney Spears - Oops I Did It Again 15
13 - Dinosaur Jr. - Swedish Fish 15
14- Boy Next Door - Door, Door 15 (sold out)
15 - Jerry Garcia - Very Best Of Jerry Garcia 14
16- Tegan & Sara - Tonight In The Dark 12
17- Various Artists - Dance Craze 12
18- Various Artists - Behind The Dykes 12 (sold out)
19- Screaming Jay Hawkins - What That Is! 11 (sold out)
20- Screaming Jay Hawkins - Because Is In Your Mind 11 (sold out)
21- Coolio - Gangsta’ Paradise 10 (sold out)
22- Ramones - It’s Alive II 10 (allocated - sold out)
23- Queen & Slim Soundtrack 10 (sold out)
24 - Hackers Soundtrack 10 (sold out)
25- Johnny Thunders and Wayne Kramer - Gang War! (sold out)

12” Singles and 7” Singles
1- Brandi Carlile - Rooster Says 60 (sold out)
2- Unrighteous Brothers - Unchained Melody 20 (sold out)
3- Jimi Hendrix - Message To Love 20
4- Black Crowes - Jealous Again 9
5- Jesse Dayton - Texas 45 RPM Showdown 5 (sold out)
6- Mike Watt - In Quintessence 5

Schoolkids
We had an amazing day, up 17% for the weekend. 10% on Sat, and another 7% today. The amazing news is that both August and Sept have been two of the best months we have had in years. Sept being the best, not counting RSD we have had the best Sept since 2015 and up about 23% from last year. This is just counting instore sales, our online sales are up too I don’t have the figures yet to give a % but it's strong. We expect a big online day tomorrow. The momentum is strong right now.

We have turned a corner and we are going to finish this year really strong. I feel a complete renewed sense of energy.
-Stephen

Homer’s
We had about 75 waiting to get in. Good weather.
Good sales. After the 2 events, we are at 81% of last year's sales, so right on track to duplicate last year. Sell-through is at 64%. Under ordered jazz and hip-hop releases. Bought Garcia, McCartney, Waters, Black Crowes and Replacements heavy as we believe these will continue to sell, so overall, sell-through is very good. Only 6 titles with no sales and sold about two dozen of RSD Drops #1 titles. I believe customers prefer these less frantic events and RSD should have a discussion about whether there should just be the two events or whether we should consider a different approach. Not sure why we were allocated on Fleetwood Mac when the sticker says 16,000 were pressed, but that was #1 bestseller.

Others include:
Brandi Carlile
Replacements
McCartney
Doors
Primus
Unrighteous Brothers
Garcia
Britney
Bill Evans

Streetlight
Greetings, Everyone!

Both stores had another successful RSD Drops Day last Saturday. Everything went smoothly with our social distancing protocols at the Santa Cruz location and our appointment system in San Jose. Here are the vital stats:

San Jose's sell-through first day was 93% (we're at 85% of last year's RSD totals thus far)
Santa Cruz's sell-through first day was 77% (we're at 99% of last year's RSD totals thus far).

Bestseller lists are below for each store. Things we could've sold all day long: Primus, Fleetwood Mac, McCartney, any of the Rap/Hip-Hop titles.

We're quite happy with the results and looking forward to next month's event!

--Paige

SJ Best Sellers
603497848300 ALTERNATE RUMOURS FLEETWOOD MAC
603497848256 SOFT PARADE: STRIPPE DOORS
603497848263 COMPLETE INCONCERATE REPLACEMENTS
821229000189 FILLMORE WEST 1-31-7 ALLMAN BROTHERS
888072155817 HACKERS / O.S.T. HACKERS / O.S.T
194491759063 SUCK ON THIS PRIMUS
602508677519 MESSAGE TO LOVE / CH HENDRIX,JIMI
602508538506 WALL: LIVE IN BERLIN WATERS,ROGER
603497848270 IT'S ALIVE II RAMONES
823134906211 LET'S GET A GROOVE O FIELDS,LEE
4050538596199 MARCH OF DIMES WILLIAMS,HANK
602508464720 MCCARTNEY MCCARTNEY,PAUL
880882396015 VERY BEST OF JERRY G GARCIA,JERRY
602508728297 STEEL WHEELS LIVE (L ROLLING STONES

SC Best Sellers
603497848300 ALTERNATE RUMOURS FLEETWOOD MAC
194491759063 SUCK ON THIS PRIMUS
888072157613 COSA NUESTRA COLON,WILLIE
602508677519 MESSAGE TO LOVE / CH HENDRIX,JIMI
607396701919 UNCHAINED MELODY / Y UNRIGHTEOUS BROTHERS
602508538506 WALL: LIVE IN BERLIN WATERS,ROGER
603497848256 SOFT PARADE: STRIPPED
603497848263 COMPLETE INCONCERATE REPLACEMENTS
603497848270 IT'S ALIVE II RAMONES
821229000189 FILLMORE WEST 1-31-7 ALLMAN BROTHERS
767981174419 HI TIDE GROOVE VARIOUS ARTIST 1
096802280283 SOME OTHER TIME: THE EVANS,BILL
602508464720 MCCARTNEY MCCARTNEY,PAUL
638302585514 WELCOME TO THE RECOR DEATH PIGGY
8055515231694 LIVING IN DARKNESS AGENT ORANGE
602508738548 JEALOUS AGAIN BLACK CROWES
823134906211 LET'S GET A GROOVE O FIELDS,LEE
664425144512 GOD'S SON NAS
020286230649 MEAT PUPPETS MEAT PUPPETS

Dearborn
RSD drop 2 was a huge success. We were about 5 times busier than a normal Saturday in September. Sales were down 15% from RSD drop 1, but I attribute that to fewer titles. We did wish lists and pulled RSD product for our customers. Everything went pretty smoothly and our customers were very happy. Selling product on our website at 1:00 helped move some product too.

Sales for drops 1&2 are very comparable to RSD 2019. If drop 3 sales are strong I believe that sales will be up 3-10% for the combination of all 3 drops vs RSD 2019.

-Kevin LeAnnais

Strictly Discs
Drop 2 was 81% of Drop 1
Drop 2 combined with Drop 1 represents 76 % of RSD 2019

We have gone the menu route and we fill orders and customers checkout outside as long as we have a line which has worked very well. We've definitely seen an uptick in mail order pieces which isn't represented in the above "front door" numbers.

I am very thankful that we can start selling online the afternoon of the drop dates; that has been a real lifesaver. Especially with so much uncertainty about future restrictions as Wisconsin and Madison are seeing a bit of uncontrolled Covid spread.

Allocations this month were a real factor with HARD cuts on much of the WEA product. AEC also continues to be slow with shipping (i.e. I received the Yardbirds RSD title today)


Lou’s
RSD Drop #1 + RSD Drop #2 = 14.9% higher that RSD 2019. Yea!

Rhino Records
Sales were about 10% down from Drop #1.
Staff felt releases were not as exciting.
We had 15 or so titles sell in the 25 to 50 range in Drop #1.
The biggest title for us was 26 of The Wall in Drop #2.
Felt like I was cut/reduced on the Fleetwood Mac.
Similar to the Wall and other titles.
Split my orders equally between AEC/AMS except where they were AEC direct titles.
Biggest Suprise– Britney Spears! Sold out of 15 in the first hour and we really are not a POP store.

Numbers-wise, if Drop 3 comes in around the same it will equal One Record Store Day from THE PREVIOUS YEAR.
And then I had 2 stores and were open for 14 hours a day for each store. 2019 is 1 store for 9 hours.
I consider that great and am very thankful that RSD is playing out this way this year. I would almost like to see something once a quarter

-----------------------------------

Thanks again to everyone that plays a part to make this event possible.

Here are the charts,
Andrea

Andrea Paschal
Executive Director
Coalition of Independent Music Stores
ThinkIndie Distribution
3738 4th Terrace North
Birmingham, AL 35222
Phone: 205.595.1932 x.208
Fax: 205.595.1938
Email : andrea@cimsmusic.com
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