Banquet Records is celebrating passing one million customer orders via its online shop.
Banquet, a former Music Week Awards winner, reached the sales milestone for mail order at the weekend.
It’s further positive news for physical music, following sales data for 2021 that showed the first year-on-year market increase in revenue terms for 20 years.
The Kingston-based record store revealed that it hit seven figures with an order for a CD and ticket bundle for Michael Ball & Alfie Boe. The Banquet event takes place on November 2 at the Pryzm venue, which regularly hosts outstore gigs for the record shop.
when @garyekins and @iknowdavehouse created https://t.co/ZpmXccN4wn (in an age before smartphones) no-one thought we'd reach ONE MILLION ORDERS.
— Banquet Records (@BanquetRecords) September 24, 2022
if anyone did, they would certainly not have guessed order 1000000 would be for Michael Ball CDs / tickets https://t.co/HXY4dMbKdP
Orders at BanquetRecords.com have increased three-fold compared to four years ago, with part of that down to the impact of Covid changing how fans purchased physical music.
After a gradual start in 2003, Banquet is now processing 100,000 online orders for delivery every six months. The web store’s biggest-selling album is The 1975’s A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships, which was available as signed CD or vinyl and as a ticket bundle for two 2018 gigs at Pryzm in Kingston.
“It’s brilliantly and horribly busy,” posted co-owner Jon Tolley on Twitter in reaction to the million orders milestone. “Things are uncertain in every aspect of what we do. We’re not perfect every time. But we’re here, creative, confident and ready. Real people. Real music. Real shop.”
Click here to read our interview with ERA CEO Kim Bayley on 20 years of music retail evolution.
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