Intrada Soundtrack Forum

Here's some thoughts for listeners to ponder when they buy their next $19.99 CD. This is not necessarily a reaction to some comment or criticism, it's just something for you wonderful folks to reflect on.

When we launched the limited edition LP of Red Dawn in 1985, we learned a lot about costs. And in 1988, with our initial limited edition collector's CD of First Blood in our then brand-new "Film Music Treasury" series, we needed to retail the discs at $19.99 in order to cover all of our costs. Thankfully, we managed. Now let us go into fast forward mode.

The following are just some of the costs to us that have increased. I am not referring to the musician fees because thankfully the historic rates have made these albums actually possible now. And I am not counting postage fees as those we factor into our retail shipping rates. Anyway, onwards.

Here's what costs have increased since our first $19.99 CD went out our door: The advances to acquire the license. The royalty rates to the studio. The mechanical licensing fees. (Yes, every time we add another track to an album, not only do we pay a higher rate, but we pay that rate so many more times over, too.) The costs of transferring the original elements. The costs of mixing, editing and mastering the music. The costs of licensing the artwork and stills for the packaging. The costs of manufacturing a disc. The costs of printing a booklet. And - of course - the labor costs at all levels of production and manufacturing and filling of orders and all that overhead stuff. And my point here?

Some 25 years later, we still retail these discs for $19.99

Just something to ponder. Don't fear a price increase or some other yucky development at this time. But maybe, just maybe, be kind of happy that you are seeing these albums come out against such challenging odds. It gets pretty crazy sometimes.
--Doug

The infinite pleasure to listen to some of our favorite music in the world. This has no price. We love you for all that. And that doesn't cost much to tell you just that.

Over at FSM I remember once reading a reply that made no sense then and especially now when reading this and that was: "There is too many labels". Each and every film music label struggle with all those costs and we (at least I appreciate your hard work) because you guys makes our dreams (of having this or that soundtrack) into reality. I guess that that FSM member does not know how lucky he/she is until the film music labels is gone. Hopefully not in many many many years.

I'm altogether pleased to pay an extra premium, and one which hasn't increased in decades, for music that I consider a "specialty" in all the best ways.

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Randy Wilson
Dallas, TX

Soundtrack CD's are expensive, but they cost what they cost. It's the price we pay for liking unpopular music & not being part of the crowd. I have to add in the p&p to Europe, which unfortunately puts paid to the casual purchase, but if it's something I want I'm happy to pay, & grateful to the record company for releasing it.

Indeed, just keeping up with inflation, something that cost $19.95 in 1985 should cost $43.36 today!

Granted, it's not as simple as that. And there is only so much that the market will bear. Still, I am amazed that a gallon of gas now costs three times what it cost in 1985, but a CD costs the same.

There's a few things to consider though. First off, it costs far less to physcially make a CD now (at least as far as everything I've read).

But more importantly there's a thing called 'perceived value'. Despite inflation, $20 today still in most people's mind still is worth a similar amount as it was 20 years ago (despite it being more like $32.37 now).
A lot of factors go into why $20 is the current 'sweet spot' for pricing. Consider a few things, for instance the sheer amount of CDs already EXISTING and thus any new disc has to compete with older ones so in a sense every time a new disc is bought they all are slightly devalued. There's also far more choices in media and just in general for 'spending money' to go toward. And hell on top of that, consider soundtracks specifically almost seem ridiculous in value (to some people) when you're paying more for 'just the music' than the whole movie. And I'm sure I'm missing others.

TerraEpon, everything you're saying about "perceived value" is absolutely true. (As far as the cost to actually make the CD, I believe that that's been the least expensive part of CD production for decades.) But producers don't live in a perceived world; they live in this one, where inflation is very much real.

Yes, of course, they'd be foolish businessmen to charge more than people will pay. But I do think it's something of a miracle that CDs still cost what they cost decades ago. I may perceive that a two-liter bottle of Diet Coke should still cost the 99¢ that I paid for it in 1990, but it still costs $2.49 or more on the store shelves.

I remember reading stuff from a guy on the old FILMUS-L list who would assess what the price of a new CD should be based on what he personally would consider paying for it. For example, he might have replied to an announcement of Intrada's "Hocus Pocus" CD by saying that in the first place he didn't like Bette Midler so that should mean a five dollar discount for having to look at her on the cover art, unless an alternate is supplied in which case he would consider waiving that. Second, the film is a silly Disney kids' movie about witches - a ridiculous concept for a film if he ever heard one - and that should be at least another sawbuck off the asking price. This clown would then conclude that $10 was the most he would consider paying for this - if he liked it, but as he has no familiarity with it, he should get a couple more bucks knocked off to entice him into trying it out.

He did this for years and seemed quite serious about it. I'd hate to think others who suffered from the same entitlement delusion were wandering about in these parts. Of course, there's the guy who posts over on FSM who says that because he buys maybe a couple CDs a month from Lalaland, he basically pays their salary (takes a special kind of math to work that out!) and is therefore entitled to dictate which cover art they should be using, which font for the track titles, and whatnot. God, there are times when I really hate the internet.

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Karl Morton IV

"Enjoy every sandwich."
-- Warren Zevon

Stupid people happen everywhere... not only on the internet...

I know I don't speak for the majority here, but I personally wouldn't have any problem with having to start paying $25 for new releases. $30 for 2-disc sets shouldn't change, though.