Singles Sales Soar

Singles sales were up 32.7 percent to 152 million in 2009, but the beleaguered High Street retailers are unlikely to be celebrating, as 98 percent of them were purchased as downloads.

With Woolworths and Zavvi going bust at the beginning of the year and Borders following suit at the end, the remaining national retail chains may get some comfort from the fact that there’s fewer of them around to share the business.

The 2009 figures published by the British Phonographic Industry also show album sales fell 3.5 percent to 128.9 million, the fifth year in a row they have fallen, although album downloads rose 56.1 percent to 16.1 million.

While singles buyers obtain 98 percent of their music online, nearly 90 percent of album buyers are still plumping for hard copy CDs or vinyl records.

Downloads are not generally as profitable to the industry as physical products. However healthy the state of the singles market, it doesn’t generate enough profit for record companies to get a return on what they’ve invested in up-and-coming bands.

The final week of 2009 saw single sales reach a record-breaking 4.22 million singles, more than in the week leading up to Christmas, a peak that may well have been caused by people loading the iPods and MP3 players they’d just received as presents.

The BPI says the album market was helped by a “healthy stream” of releases from artists such as Susan Boyle, Lady Gaga, Michael Bublé, JLS and Robbie Williams. Boyle’s “I Dreamed A Dream” was the best-selling album in the UK.

BPI chief executive Geoff Taylor said UK sales remained “relatively resilient” despite the ever-present competition from illegal downloading.