Friday to be announced as global release day

The IFPI is on the verge of announcing Friday as the chosen global release day, Music Week understands.The move would bring all territories in line with Australia and Germany, amongst others, but would mean big changes in other countries including the UK and the US. Music Week sources have said that US retailer Target could even drop music from its stores altogether as a result of the costs incurred.

Those in favour of choosing Friday as the global release day hope to benefit from higher footfall in shops at the end of the week.

Although she would not confirm the chosen global release day, or exactly when an announcement would be made, IFPI CEO Frances Moore told Music Week, “The whole dynamic of the global release day consultation has been driven by one thing and one thing only – how best to serve the music consumer.”

“We’ve had a long consultation involving retailers artists and record labels, and we have looked at a large amount of insight and research. The good news has been the widespread support we’ve seen around the world for global release day – no one has seriously questioned the concept, the only debate has been about the day. The artist organisations and many retailers and record companies internationally support Friday, and this is backed by consumer research in many countries.

“There are other voices who prefer other days, and that’s not surprising. It would be very surprising if a project like this, involving over 50 national markets, didn’t lead to some objections in some markets. However, there is no doubt we have had a long and thorough consultation with the stakeholders involved and we now intend to make an announcement as soon as possible.”

Those ‘other voices’ include Beggars Group boss Martin Mills who, during a speech at an ERA conference in London today, suggested that discussions around a global release day have not included the independent community – describing consultations as a “charade”.

“I have concerns about the proposed global release day,” he said. “Whilst I acknowledge the needs of a digital world for co-ordination, it seems to me to be crazy to throw away one of the trading week’s two peaks, and the ability to re-stock and rectify errors before the week’s second peak.

“It astounds me that the major labels are not listening to their customers, their interface with their artists’ fans. I fear their consultation has been a charade, and the market leaders were always going to push this through. I fear this move will also lead to a market in which the mainstream dominates, and the niche, which can be tomorrow’s mainstream, is further marginalised. I fear it will further cement the dominance of the few – and that that is exactly what it is intended to do.”

The IFPI confirmed discussions about a global release day with a range of stakeholders across the music industry in August last year – with a Friday release day being proposed at the time.

Source: Music Week