Mercury Records To Stop Release Of Physical Singles
Friday, 25 March 2011
Written by James Conlon
Mercury Records has announced that the company will be stopping the production of physical singles. The label, which is home to the likes of The Killers, Arcade Fire, Pixie Lott and U2 has revealed that they will no longer be producing physical singles (both CD and Vinyl) except on “rare occasions”.
The company suffered a financial loss on single releases last year, and have now claimed that they will only be producing physical versions of singles in rare cases when a track “is guaranteed to make a profit”.
A spokeswoman for the company said: "For the past couple of years we have released physical singles only when there is demand. With physical formats now accounting for just over 1% of the overall singles market we are being more cautious."
She added: "That said, physical singles are not disappearing and we will still release them when there is a demand."
Figures from the Official Chart Company earlier this year confirmed that the physical purchase of singles has been on the decline in recent years. In the past five years sales of 7” singles have fallen from over 1 million to just 152,000 in 2010 – an 85% drop.
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