![]() ![]() ![]() What we had in the ’90s was… what another very famous, huge record executive in a very, very hilarious way. It’s all one thing, and they’re completely aligned against the artist in every case.” I was talking to someone who was handwringing about Spotify, a fellow musician who wrote an editorial, and when we were talking about the whole thing, he said, “You know, there’s no reason to yell at any particular party, because they all have equity in each other. SFJ: There’s a lot to talk about in that it mirrors the larger economy… You know, all the mergers that happened at the corporate level are now happening at the musical level. That’s the entry point into the below conversation. They also reminisce about all the characters they worked with, including one man (featured in The Target Shoots First) whose windowless office featured stacks and stacks of paper printouts, piled haphazardly on every available surface. ![]() Each participant in the call had a hand in producing the colorful catalogs that were mailed to members, the ones listing hundreds and hundreds of CDs and cassettes available to purchase in a given month. The quartet immediately jumps into conversation, covering the quirks of their time at the company with plenty of laughter (and, on occasion, some cynicism). That comes up time and again when Wilcha and several of his Columbia House co-workers-former New Yorker pop critic/musician Sasha Frere-Jones, author/teacher Alysia Abbott, and journalist/editor/content strategist Piotr Orlov-hop on a conference call with The A.V. ![]() Twenty years after it was filmed, what’s incredible about Wilcha’s documentary is how the experience of working at Columbia House informs (and, at times, even parallels) the modern media landscape. Whether buyers were allowance-challenged, wanting to replace fusty vinyl with shiny plastic CDs, or simply not within driving distance of a store that sold music, Columbia House was clearly addressing consumer demand. So what if these CDs were way more expensive than ones purchased in stores, after factoring in shipping? After all, gaming the system by joining under fake name(s) or addresses-or sending back unwanted albums or accidental orders by scrawling “return to sender” on the box in which they arrived-was a snap. Special offers along the way, like snagging discounted bonus albums after buying one at full price, made the premise even sweeter.īy the mid-’90s, too-good-to-be-true deals such as eight (or more) CDs or 12 cassettes for a penny had codified into pop culture lore. Through it all, the company’s hook remained enticing: Get a sizable stack of albums for just a penny, with no money owed up front, and then just buy a few more at regular price over time to fulfill the membership agreement. Started in 1955 as a way for the record label Columbia to sell vinyl records via mail order, the club had continually adapted to and changed with the times, as new formats such as 8-tracks, cassettes, and CDs emerged and influenced how consumers listened to music. Time Warner bought half the shares in Columbia House with the intention of breaking the domination of the “mixed tape” industry by Time-Life.īy 1996, Columbia House had 16 million members and finally launched its own website.Any music fan eager to bulk up their collection in the ’90s knew where to go to grab a ton of music on the cheap: Columbia House. It too did very well and by 1988 had over 6 million members!Īnd in 1991, Time Warner in its quest to become one of the biggest companies in media arrived. The CBS Video Club broke away from the Columbia House brand during the 1980s and introduced a similar business model for videos. So Columbia House made reel-to-reel tapes, for example, even though the market for such tapes was officially dead.Ĭolombia House, in fact, continued to support 8 track releases until 1988, long after the rest of the market had given up on the format. However, it not only produced vinyl but was capable of delivering old discontinued formats. The Columbia House brand was started in the 1960s to differentiate the mail order records from mail order cassettes (and, indeed 8-track cartridges). ![]()
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