Phasing out of Compact Disc

Within just 6 months after the initial introduction of the CD in 1982, 50% of the existing LP manufacturing plants in North America had closed their doors - and they had done so at a time when CD sales still made up only a small fraction of the remaining music media sales. More LP closures were to follow after that. Apparently the LP did not die because of "sales" actually, but because of a calculated decision to shut LP production down, having the effect of giving the masses no real alternative but to switch to CD's.

The unanswered question in my mind has been whether or not the early shut downs (in the face of the still rather large LP share of the market at the time) had become, in fact, largely contractual? Or was it simply a result of the industry "come-to-Jesus" meeting that undoubtedly would've occurred before and as the CD was being launched (and the LP manufacturers simply saw the writing on the wall and *voluntarily* closed their doors in the face of expectations of plummeting sales and mounting [internal] industry hype).

But, I am curious as to why so many LP makers caved as early as they did. Were they paid or compensated to close their doors when they did?...in order to facilitate a speedy changeover to CD that otherwise, were it left to be sales driven in a free market, might have dragged out longer than industry backers of CD might have been financially willing to accept?

Can I get a "kickback" here??

Might there be similar deals brewing behind closed doors now in respect to downloads or streaming? I'm thinking yes, but we'll see. Happy listening.

The real victim in all this was audio cassettes, which if you'll pardon me for saying so are more musical and more dynamic than either LP or CD. By the end of the cassette era the frequency response was quite good, good enough considering how inherent musical and dynamic they are. No medium is perfect, but cassettes are the closest to real music in my opinion. Tape is a natural medium. It breathes.

"Tape is a natural medium. It breathes."

Some would call that hiss/noise.

Ivan,

I don't know the contractual dynamics behind the decisions to shut LP production facilities in 1982/1983, but I do know that LP sales had been essentially flat for a decade by that time. Over the course of that same 10 year period, cassette sales went from less than 10% of the market to more than 50% of the market (units sold, long play capacity). Given the pending introduction of another "playback only" format (cd), it's easy to see why the record companies would shift resources to CD production. The opportunity to resell the catalog in the new format was surely compelling, but it doesn't change the fact that LP sales were long stagnant when the changeover occurred and that cassette sales were growing rapidly. I'd still characterize the dynamic as cassettes killing LP and CD killing cassettes (especially once CD gained usable recording capability in the early 1990s).

I, too, think the cassette format (as it existed in from the late 70's to the mid 80's) was vastly underrated. It's just that I never met a prerecorded cassette that I liked, and you have to have a format you can record from (besides radio).

Martykl,

"I don't know the contractual dynamics behind the decisions to shut LP production facilities in 1982/1983, but I do know that LP sales had been essentially flat for a decade by that time. Over the course of that same 10 year period, cassette sales went from less than 10% of the market to more than 50% of the market (units sold, long play capacity)".

Agreed, certainly.

"The opportunity to resell the catalog in the new format was surely compelling...".

Could be...but I'm not so sure. We take it for granted any more that such a formula is tried and true, however at the time it may have seemed a little more risky to those involved, than today. What if it flopped?..and all that. I even suspect that the more record plants that closed early on the more incentive was created for the remaining ones to stay open and play for the money that they believed was left on the table as a result, but that's just a suspicion of mine.

"I'd still characterize the dynamic as cassettes killing LP and CD killing cassettes (especially once CD gained usable recording capability in the early 1990s)".

I'd say all that had to be a contributing factor...however, due to copyright problems, CD recording actually never got off the ground sales-wise and still hasn't...but, if I recall, the perception, at least, that it would allow users to make "perfect" copies was in the air in those days.