[NewMusic] record stores

[Damon Smith]

On Apr 11, 2007, at 11:06 AM, Phillip Greenlief wrote:

> But Amoeba has been hit hard by internet record sales. Marc almost
> closed the Berkeley store last year - not too many people knew that -
> apparently sales were down in a big way and he was scared. Instead, he
> installed listening booths and decided to take Amoeba online (it will
> happen soon).
>

-They had a lot of other problems too, like going more for the pop 
stuff to make a quick buck and letting the specialty areas slide, and 
those are all that is going to keep them in business now.
They don't stay up on new releases very well and then people who like 
this and other obscure music have been forced to look elsewhere in turn 
hurting our own sales.

The used buy counter is another problem, first they are cheap this both 
pisses off sellers who in turn buy less like me and then keeps them 
from getting any real rare stock. If have a rare lp to sell it goes to 
groove yard or ebay. It got really tiresome to buy import CDs they 
ordered at $20 and then have some indie rock ass with a chip on their 
shoulder offer you $3 for because it didn't sell (Then why order it in 
the first place?).
Second, they let the buyers act like assholes. Customer service ends at 
the buy counter unless you know person or get really lucky.
marc and some of the other owners are really nice but after being 
screwed so many times at the buy counter (after spending thousands and 
thousands of $$ there)  I now give them as little as possible.

There is a lot they could have/could do to stay viable but they are not 
going to. The other  truth is the used cd/lp maket gives nothing to the 
artists  so it is every bit as (un?)ethical to download illegally if 
you won't pay for it new.



Damon Smith

http://www.balancepointacoustics.com
http://myspace.com/smithdamon

Just released:
bpa009 "sperrgut" birgit ulher/damon smith/martin blume
bpa 010 "cruxes"  aurora josephson/joelle leandre/damon smith/martin 
blume
bpa 011 "sextesense" john butcher/aaron bennett/henry kaiser/danielle 
degruttola/damon smith/jerome bryerton