UK Music Sales Continue To Slide
New figures are grim reading for record labels
Record sales continued to drop in 2010 according to the latest industry figures.
The British Recorded Music Industry (BPI) said combined digital and physical album sales fell 7% last year, from 128.9 million to 119.9 million.
Digital analyst Mark Mulligan told the BBC that the figures were not surprising, adding "alternative products are needed".
"The simple fact is that CD sales are declining much more quickly than digital sales are growing," he went on. Worse still, download sales growth is slowing. There is nothing in current trends to suggest that download sales are going to accelerate quickly enough to turn around music sales anytime soon. New alternative music products are needed. 99p downloads aren't enough."
Digital sales now make up a fifth of album sales, after growing 30% in the past 12 months.
However, illegal downloads have continued to flourish, and the BPI says that this is largely to blame for plummeting sales.
Jim Killock of the Open Rights Group counters this, though, telling the BBC: "Music companies should make albums more compelling, rather than calling for families to be cut off the internet. Music competes with games, video and TV for your hard-earned cash," he continued. Record labels are masters of their own fate and need to stop blaming their customers for their industry's own failures."
Yesterday it was revealed that a fall in revenue meant that HMV was to close 60 stores around the UK to help reduce overheads as it tries to compete with the download market and online retailers.