Vinyl Record Pressing Plants The raise of the Pheonix and back to ashes?

[armshouse]

If someone could buy a defunct plant and make a more profitable one out of it good for them. What is worse is that new plants are still opening up with new equipment while used equipment sits unsold. I am old enough to remember the days when tons of machines from the major label plants were sent to the scrap yard, I suspect we will see a few machines scrapped again in the future.

[mossboss]

OK I read this with a bit of a smirk, So someone buys a defunct plant and resurrects it, great, so he is better clued up than the previous guys?
He'll get the work the others did not get? make a better product? hard to see I am afraid
How is this going to be a winner for the new guys when there is a lack of margin and orders?
The pandemic days with 6 plus months delivery time are gone! People, put simply, are not spending
Sure they will have a much lower entry cost however that does not alleviate the issue of lack of activity out there, or the very fact that plants just pressing cannot survive at current prices as they only process PVC
Best

[armshouse]

Don't misunderstand me Moss, I agree with you completely the point I was making is that even worse than the scenario you describe is that the few new plants that are still in the process of setting up are not doing so with less expensive used machines, they seem to all be doing it with brand new full price ones. Clearly worse for them and worse for an industry suffering from over capacity. The bottom line is that a lot of plants have been running like a ponzi scheme (without the ill intent). New deposits give them the capital to finish old jobs with deposits paid long ago. When turn times went up to a year that was a lot of paid deposits to use for operating expenses. I think you suggested somewhere in this thread that plants should pretend they had to refund every deposit on the books and see if they are in the black or in the red. I think we know what the answer would be for the ones who only process PVC.

[mossboss]

Well you are 100% correct I misread your post, I was rather surprised to see ppl in Haarlem clamouring at the prospect of setting up a pressing plant somewhere in the world including a couple in Europe
You know whenever things turned into sh.. for me in the past, I used to say "That's the Vinyl Truth" it does seem appropriate today
Yes the unintended Ponzi scheme has started showing up in no uncertain terms, suppose the deposits are depleted the plant will be looking for new orders with the lowest cost of finance customer deposits, in the absence of new orders sufficient to keep up the running cost it be a shutdown clients looking their records or for a refund via the administrators of the collapsed entity
Sad state of affairs to be frank but that would be the hard reality "The vinyl truth"
Best

[armshouse]

One more down, Softwax (Philadelphia, USA) has closed.

[Phinster]

Hi Mossboss, you forgot to mention Icarus who flew too high and got burned! A few of us always believed this rise as a bubble that was not going to burst but perhaps develop a slow leak...dear old gramophone records, back for all the wrong reasons!

[displacedsnail]

oh gosh, when did Softwax close?! They've made a handful of records for me, and it was such a treat to have a plant in driving distance. Dang!

[mossboss]

Hi Mossboss, you forgot to mention Icarus who flew too high and got burned! A few of us always believed this rise as a bubble that was not going to burst but perhaps develop a slow leak...dear old gramophone records, back for all the wrong reasons!

How right you are!! you forgot to mention that his father Daedalus told him not to fly to close to the sun! he did not take notice of the old mans advise, he did not get burned either
According to the myth the wax holding the feathers together melted resulting in him plunging to his death in the sea, there is a stretch of the Mediterranean sea called Icarion pelagos after him purportedly where he plunged to his inglorious death
So where are the parallels?
Not taking notice of history, its a slow leak aright, it will take a while to deflate as it was a great big bubble indeed and it is only partly deflated, it has yet some way to go, watch it
It will not go off with a bang rather a slow painful death for quite a lot of them out there
When major players in the pressing game started ditching orders under 300 or 500 the newcomers thought that it was a money making bonanza so jump in they did, they dealt with the rejected clients since there seem to be no end in sight of the boom
Why a boom? Pandemic! people at home scratching their balls with money for nothing coming in and nowhere to spend it No pubs No events No restaurants no this that and the other
Musicians started pumping out albums singles and sales where through the roof so lets do another one great, labels started reissuing titles like there was a renaissance which it was, quite unexpected
The money that governments pumped in is all gone back to its "rightful owners" we are now back to normality
Alas the bigger plants are now taking any order that's out there starving them out, bigger plants always had and have the upper hand Cutting Plating pressing printing packaging all under one roof and each step a profit center albeit a small one, added all up it is still a profit
How on earth a pressing plant processing plastic ie PVC compound can survive is certainly beyond me, no it will not be a death blow for the vinyl record comeback, there is a momentum there that despite the slowdown it will remain as a viable industry but very much a smaller one than what we have seen in recent times
I don't suggest in any way that the newish gear that's going to be and in some case is available at half or less new price out there by plants shutting down, be taken up by another entity as I don't see any future assuming they adopt the same model, than again from what I have seen at the last making vinyl event recently it would not surprise me
So wait and see some of those plants been resurrected by someone than see them hitting the wall not to long down the path, in particular competing on price which is a certain death wish, alternatively they can make the cutting plating and printing guys rich while their are struggling with a false sense of doing shit really, letting an auto or semi auto machine squeeze a piece of plastic into a record, they think they are doing something unique WTF
That's the "Vinyl Truth"
Best

[Phinster]

The 'Vinyl Truth' Nice one Chris !!

[armshouse]

In the time since this thread was started I count no less than 9 small plants that have opened in the US
1 - Minnesota
1 - Florida
3 - California
2 - Texas
1 - North Carolina
1 - Pennsylvania
I may be missing one or two, and there are also a couple more in the works. All are 1 - 2 press operations, most are manual presses and all of them only press. I would love to understand what the projected cost per record is in all these plants, and further, once they are up and running was that number correct. I honestly don't understand how the cost per record can be less than the selling price of a record at this scale. It would be really useful for people who are going down this road to get that information but it seems that once a plant closes that info can never be shared and the cycle repeats. The vinyl truth that is never told! If anyone on the forum can tell the story of how they made a business plan to start a plant and what numbers were right and what numbers were wrong it would be useful for all.

[mossboss]

Yes My good friend "The Vinyl Truth"
I can go on about it ad infinitum what difference will it make?
I have repeatedly told a lot of people DON'T DO IT Booh
Next thing they are into it
Here is an example
A young fellow got a gig with pay when I was in Florida running a plant He was there for around 3 months, not to get and keep a job, He just wanted to learn, not a bad worker at all and a fast learner besides
After a year and some months he had gathered enough "investors" to fund a pressing plant, well, he is there amongst the ones that gone out
I have Observed the following
Most new plants have been established by audio guys, musicians with a love of vinyl, record collectors, or vinyl record buyers
I have yet to come across a new plant owner with engineering or previous experience in the game, some old farts like me that do have experience are there for the gig, get paid, don't worry about it until the weekly pay check stops or looking shaky, they than move on
Now what do they all have in common?
They see the wholesale price and or retail price than they say , hey how hard is it?
Lets go for it, we will be boutique offer great service, special records and packaging etc etc, not like the big plants, that they don't care about the small orders the struggling muso or the band, there money to be made besides so they go for it, look at every new plant website that's the general message they send it seems to be quite prevalent
The following also has a bearing, in the last few year there has been more than one new record press manufacturer, they have sold a lot of machines worldwide resulting in a huge overcapacity situation
My guess is that well over 600, most likely closer to 700 record presses have been manufactured and sold, than put into production in the last 6 years what we are seeing is a combination of all the above coming all together, we are seeing is only the start
That's "The Vinyl Truth"
Chris

[armshouse]

When the only way to start a plant was to do it with old machines this kept capacity at a limit, but more importantly it forced new people to interact with the old timers because there was no other way to figure out how to obtain or use the machines. The thread that ran for years about new plant start up costs shared this information which I imagine stopped a lot of dreamers in their tracks and provided incredibly useful information to the people who went ahead with it. I think that when the new machines came on the market in addition to sending us down this path of extreme over capacity it led to a scenario where the new people got all their info from the press manufacturers and not the people who had been in the business for decades. The info you can get on lathe trolls is much more accurate than what the people selling you the machines can supply, but I think sadly the people who need this info are not here.

[mossboss]

Yes that's the way it was Not sure that it was the best but we had no choice
It also needs be said that quite a lot of these old presses the Hamiltons SMT's and Leneds, New World, Finebilt, Alphas and the TTT's where well built machines that just kept going on and on kept in tune by the old timers, there are quite a lot of them still in production all over the world
Visiting Record Industry in Holland recently machines from 1980's were pumping out records including the auto sleeving attachment doing a fine job, why? the plants original employees who are retiring now or have retired have taught another generation of people
It is the same in GZ they run machines from the 70-80's plus a lot of new ones as well, same deal, old timers teaching younger people the game, United in the USA same again, here at Zenith our plant same deal our oldest machine was produced in 1967!! with a few some years later
Yes we are doing the same all young people here and some of them with us over 10 years
They know the way, they learn, they can apply the lessons here there or wherever Do they have any business acumen? Most likely not, but they do know how to do every part of the process at least here in our small plant all of our people get exposure on every aspect of the process
New hires start in packing! Why? well we combine a second stage of QC at packing so they learn what level of quality is expected and be sleeved and packed
Than it is on the press, next is galvanics, assuming they get that far and up to scratch than a stretch with the cutting engineers, not to cut but to get a real understanding of what we do and what they need to be doing
I can confidently say some of our guys here can switch roles here or within any plant anywhere, where else does that happen???
This thread has covered a lot of issues in relation to pressing, industry insights, a rather diverse number of people have contributed views opinions great input
Dan has pointed out it is most likely the most comprehensive resource for any aspiring entrant in the game, may be a bit late for some but that's life
and
"The vinyl Truth"
Best

[armshouse]

There is an interesting episode of a Nashville based podcast called "Music Citizens" that just came out. Without having any prior knowledge of the record manufacturing industry they dive right into the over capacity issue that Moss and I are here prattling on about. Check it out:


https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/music-citizens/id1753080903?i=1000677769269

[mossboss]

Spend the time listening to this Thank you Dan, very insightful, to the point? some points? My view, the guy from GZ is a new boy in the block, young bright eyed and bushy tailed, he can see nothing else but success for GZ, rightfully so? who knows, full of enthusiasm, nothing negative about the game out of his mouth, Micheals from URP got it right, but he is early 70 odd yo
The lady with the 8 Hamiltons? well there ain't enough artists out there to buy into that dream,
The Vinyl Lab? they will be labouring away no doubt until ????
Any way what would I know?
Just an old fart with an empty Give A fark bag
"The vinyl Truth"
Best

[untitledthe]

There is an interesting episode of a Nashville based podcast called "Music Citizens" that just came out. Without having any prior knowledge of the record manufacturing industry they dive right into the over capacity issue that Moss and I are here prattling on about. Check it out:


https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/music-citizens/id1753080903?i=1000677769269

Very nice podcast. Definitely puts you with the nose on the points and hear how the industry is rolling nowadays after the sky is the limit time. Troublesome for some perhaps and i dont think thats only for the little plants. Enormous plants that are used to 10000 pieces orders which are now eager for a 100 pieces order says something too, before you know it 'production needs to be concentrated' just like you here from Volkswagen in Germany currently. Everybody needs to carve out its own market and i think a smaller plant builds up a more loyal customer base then something like GZ. People true at heart.

[mossboss]

Hello every one here
Let me give every one a few first hand experiences, We at Zenith have been serving the game in our isolated market for about 20 odd years we are in Australia long way from anywhere, the ONLY pressing plant for most of those years
We had a branch of the Vinyl Factory located in Sydney for maybe a year or two a while back, they shut their doors and disappeared into the blue yonder, a lots of hoo-ha in the process of them opening up promos etc, they took some of the jobs away, back than every job was precious, but we weathered it stuck to the knitting never got into a price war or said anything about it, so we were the only ones here again
So some years ago another outfit decided that they can do it better faster cheaper so they spend a small fortune selling the farm to do it and here they are, just on our back yard, another in another state with one machine also started up for resons known to most of us here, good luck to them both
Two new presses brand new setup as a guess a $1.5+ M investment, lots of hoo-ha press social media the normal stuff, end result on the sky is the limit days all busy including the new guys, we certainly lost clients, they have been with us for years, out of necessity in some cases as some out there regretted the fact that they did not have a choice apart from pressing overseas at a much higher cost which they did and some still do, want to bank on loyalty Ha farking Ha
That's the commercial reality of any business, competition is healthy as the saying goes, not much one can do about it particularly when by whatever reason there is a perception that one is in a monopolistic position not through planing or desire just by the fact that they are pursuing something that others did not see as anything viable, and rightfully so because it was not, we decided that we will just do it regardless
So whats the point?
Loyalty! Specialists, Indie, small personalised service and all that mantra which is so common in the industry by the new comers is all bullshit
Let me tell all who read this, Loyalty is a very very small part, Price is the determining factor, A dollar cheaper than another quote for an order of $5K your out of the picture, its gone to the $5K minus $1 and it is as simple as that
Quality is expected by the client whoever does the job, the majors that's another kettle of fish for another time, want to hang your hat on loyalty as well as bagging the major plants good luck with that, you will loose out
A vinyl record has to meet a certain standard across the board if it does not you will not get paid, so that's a no brainer, do the job make a profit so you can stay in the game look after your part of the bargain there is no problem for either party, however when there are so many players in the game who have resources that are not available to some others, and are looking for every order out there who do you think will survive? the people that have jumped in attempting to cash in on that unforeseen boom?
I doubt it and the present situation with plants falling over confirms that view, seen it 3 times already boom and bust, the fallout this time will be felt by a larger group of people, ie machine manufacturers, printing outfits, PVC compound suppliers, supporting industries as freight service people etc etc
It has only started, that 6-8% in increased sales year on year as reported recently will be eaten up by the plants that will weather the storm or is it a hurricane, time will tell

And
"That's the Vinyl Truth"
Best

[untitledthe]

As one of the few newcomers on here that actually says something (and doesnt care to look like a fool) i dont think things are that extreme as they appear at first sight. As long as you keep your investment as low as possible and dont put all your eggs in one basket it will turn out just fine. A lot of people are just doing the opposite and are in a hurry and with that cut themselves in the fingers for the future making it extra hard. Offcourse its not only loyalthy that keeps the boat a float but i think there are differences between the customers of a big plant and small ones and you have to build up a (repeating) customer network for yourself like any other business. There is nothing wrong with big plants or company groups (i work for such a employer myself and they take care of the people).

On another note, Deepgrooves in Netherland is going to restart with 2 new investors, one a entrepreneur with a history picking up backrupt companies and the other a artist.

[farmersplow]

I have been following this article with great interest since the beginning. I have no experience in vinyl production - I would like to say that right away. But I do have a lot of experience in the production industry in general and a lot of experience in the automotive industry. I've worked with thousands of car dealers and garages over 35 years and seen many come and go. Long-established ones had to go too, but it was the small number of businesses. Newcomers had a hard time and most of them had to leave again or were taken over by larger companies. Larger and long-established businesses usually have more staying power, even in difficult times. But there were always exceptions, and these exceptions scared the big and long-established companies and gave hope to the small and new ones.
Newcomers were always asked: “Do you know how you can earn a million in this business? You have to invest 10 million”. I myself never wanted to believe this stupid joke, but there was a lot of truth behind it.

[mossboss]

Deep Grooves Plant
Yep The Phoenix is raising Ha
Announced and taken over on the 24 of this month,
On linked in someone was asking about people who paid deposits or in full previously for pressings, if they are going to get their records or a refund, of course there was no reply as of yesterday to that question
I don't see why the new entity has any responsibility for the sins of the previous operators, in legal terms None, as a matter of goodwill or consideration may be an offer of some future discount or a some accommodation be offered out of the goodness of their heart, but not a legal obligation to do so
Not sure that letting someone out of Jail than going in that same Jail occupying their cell its a good idea, they know better I guess, Ha
Best