14 Music Week 12.07.13
www.musicweek.com
BUSINESSANALYSIS Q2 RECORD SALES MARKET SHARES: VIRGIN/EMI JUMPS TO TOP OF LABEL LEADERBOARD SHIFTING UNRIVALLED 9.2%
David Joseph set a target in January of Virgin becoming Universal’s No 1 outlet within three years, but it only needed until Q2 to fulfil that and much more.
Under the branding of Virgin EMI, the operation claimed
an unrivalled 9.2% share of full- and mid-price albums sales in Q2, pushing Columbia into second place with 8.1% after a run that included chart-toppers from Daft Punk and Tom Odell and fellow Sony-owned RCA in third place with 7.9%. Virgin EMI in terms of what constituted its market share
in the quarter was effectively the old Mercury Records and Virgin Records as acquired by Universal last year. Bringing those two companies together has created a new record company powerhouse that in Q2 provided an appetising mix of the likes of Emeli Sande and Bastille from the Virgin side and talent including Taylor Swift and Jake Bugg from what was Mercury. Virgin EMI was one of five Universal businesses among
the 10 leading albums companies of the quarter as the major controlled 34.0% of the sales of non-budget releases with highlights including Rod Stewart’s Time, Settle by Disclosure and Black Sabbath’s 13. Universal’s share was up from 33.5% in the equivalent period in 2012 when it was not yet controlling any assets from EMI, but despite that $1.9bn (£1.2bn) takeover it actually sold fewer albums 12 months on. Universal’s album sales dropped 1.2% year-on-year in the quarter, better than the overall market fall of 5.2%, but this compared to main rival Sony’s own sales leaping by 28.6% as it enjoyed a run that included former Virgin signings Daft Punk having the top-selling artist album. In May Sony’s buyout of EMI’s 50% stake in Now! that the EC made Universal sell went through and this meant it got its hands on a share of the quarter’s two biggest compilations. With partner Universal, it saw Now! 84 shift nearly 400,000 copies, while Now That’s What I Call 30 Years, marking the compilation brand’s own first three decades, was a few thousand short of 150,000 sales. These helped to lift its share of the various artists market year-on- year from 14.1% to 21.7%. Across all non-budget albums Sony controlled 20.2% of
sales, up from 15.3% 12 months earlier, but in Warner and its new addition of the Parlophone Label Group (PLG) it faces a close new rival. Prior to its £487m takeover of PLG at the year’s mid-point Warner had a 13.1% albums market share in Q2, but add in PLG’s share and that lifts to 19.1%, less than a percentage point behind Sony. With the exception of a first album from Gabrielle Aplin,
PLG was quiet on the new release front in the quarter but Warner kept itself very busy with brand new albums from Michael Buble and Rudimental to lift its own non-budget album sales by 10.0% year-on-year. On singles Universal came close to handling 40% of the
market with a 39.6% share that included Robin Thicke’s Blurred Lights with TI and Pharrell Williams, the period’s second top seller, and Naughty Boy’s chart-topping La La La with Sam Smith. As on albums, Universal controlled more sales than Sony and Warner combined, but its lead on singles was even more pronounced with its 39.6% up against a joint score of 34.6% for its two rivals. As Universal’s singles sales rose 12.8% annually, helped
by the addition of EMI repertoire to its operations, Sony enjoyed a 10.2% boost as Daft Punk’s Get Lucky with Pharrell Williams beat all-comers with an unrivalled million copies sold. Competing against a second quarter in 2012 when it scored substantial hits with singles from Fun, Flo Rida and Rudimental, Warner’s own market share dropped from
SINGLES BY GROUP SHARE Sony 21.5%
Warner 13.1%
EMI 3.9% Ministry of Sound 2.4% Nettwerk 1.5% Macklemore 1.5% XL Beggars 1.1% Demon 0.4% Domino 0.4%
0 5 10152025303540
ALBUMS BY DISTRIBUTOR SHARE Arvato 39.5%
Universal 13.3%
EMI 8.1% Sony 7.5%
Warner 5.1%
Sony DADC 4.2% PIAS Arvato 3.1%
ADA Arvato 1.6% The Orchard 1.5% Fuga1.4%
0
10 15 20 25 30 35 40
0 5
Q211 Q311 Q411 Q112 Q212 Q312 Q412 Q113 Q213
UNIVERSAL SONY WARNER EMI INDEPENDENTS
TOTAL ALBUMS MARKET SHARE (%) SINCE Q2 11
10 15 20 25 30 35 40
0 5
Q211 Q311 Q411 Q112 Q212 Q312 Q412 Q113 Q213
UNIVERSAL INDEPENDENTS SONY EMI WARNER
15.8% to 13.1% as it sold nearly 1.2 million fewer singles. Passenger’s Let Her Go and All The Lights are
comfortably Nettwerk’s biggest-selling singles and albums of all time in the UK and they gave the independent its best market share figures yet. It handled 1.5% of singles shares in Q2, while controlled 0.8% of non-budget albums. Only Ministry of Sound among independents shifted more singles over the three months than Nettwerk as it was led by Duke Dumont’s Need U (100 Percent) with A*M*E and So Good To Me by Chris Malinchak. The Macklemore label appeared for a second successive period among the Top 10 singles groups as Thrift Shop was followed by
5 10152025303540 SINGLES MARKET SHARE (%) SINCE Q2 11 0 EMI 6.0%
Ministry of Sound 3.2% XL Beggars 2.3% Demon 1.2%
Dramatico 0.9% Nettwerk 0.8% Ignition 0.7% Union Square 0.6%
5 101520253035
ALBUMS BY COMPANY SHARE Virgin/EMI 9.2%
Columbia 8.1% RCA 7.9%
Polydor 6.7% Warner Bros 5.1%
UMTV 4.9% Island 4.5% Atlantic 4.4% Decca 4.2%
Ministry of Sound 3.2% 02 468 10 ARTIST ALBUMS MARKET SHARE (%) SINCE Q2 11
10 15 20 25 30 35 40
0 5
Q211 Q311 Q411 Q112 Q212 Q312 Q412 Q113 Q213
UNIVERSAL INDEPENDENTS SONY WARNER EMI
COMPILATIONS MARKET SHARE (%) SINCE Q2 11
10 15 20 25 30 35 40
0 5
Q211 Q311 Q411 Q112 Q212 Q312 Q412 Q113 Q213
UNIVERSAL EMI INDEPENDENTS SONY WARNER
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’s Can’t Hold Us. On albums Ministry was comfortably the leading independent with a market share of 3.2% helped by a 35.0% lift in its compilation sales with successes here including The Sound Of Deep House and Marbella Sessions 2013. Although up against a Q2 last year when its Adele album 21 led the market, XL Beggars had an active three months a year on with successes including Queens Of The Stone Age and Vampire Weekend to give it a 2.3% albums share. Also among the Top 10 companies was Dramatico, which achieved its first non-Katie Melua No 1 with Carlo Emerald’s The Shocking Miss Emerald.
Universal 39.6%
ALBUMS BY GROUP SHARE Sony 20.2%
Warner 13.1% Universal 34.0%
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48