JPF Home Page Forums General Messages Industry Message Forum CD being sold on Amazon w/o permission

Hi, Christine,

Thanks for offerng your point of view...I complaetely agree with you!

I got an email from CD Baby saying that they do fulfill orders that are initially made form other parties...that doesn't bother me - even though there is a mark up...because I should get a cut of that from CD Baby, right? What REALLY bothers me is knowing that there are these outfits that copy your cD and sell if as NEW....no quality control or any type of royalty...but...I guess, that's how thigns work now. A while back, someone chewed me out for thinking that I should be entitled to any sort of compensation...that I wasn't in touch with the real world of bootlegging and sharing files.

Emily

I did a search for some of my CDs on Amazon but none turned up.Then again I never signed up for the wholesale deal through CD Baby.

Everett

Someone I know just ordered one of my CD's from Amamzon...but...if hasn't registered as a CD Baby sale. Hmmm...will keep you posted.

Emily

I think there are enough of you posting here to indicate this is a pattern and a practice. It merits investigation. This is your business, however large or small. Somebody's selling your merchandise, and you don't know if it's theirs, bought and paid for, and so they can sell it if they want to, unless there's some legal prohibition against that, OR, they're illegally duplicating your product. I think one poster said the one they checked out was a duplication coming in a paper sleeve.
I think CD Baby and Amazon should be asked to investigate this and assure buyers and sellers these are legal and legitimate transactions and not piracy. This is intellectual property, subject to copyright infringement laws.
And, I think we need to alert the indie community on every site we are party to. If you have a myspace page, blog about the pattern and practice and let's build a protest wave Amazon can't ignore. Ultimately, I think it's their responsibility to assure their services are not party to a crime.

Keep us informed.If something crooked is going on,we all may be getting taken.There is power in numbers,lets multiply.

Everett

Hey everyone,

If you find your CD has been listed at Amazon by someone other than you, you should immediately sign up as a reseller yourself! Offer it at your own price and put a note in your listing that it comes "direct from the artist." That's what I did.

Go here to set it up. It's free:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/seller/sell-your-stuff.html/ref=ss_m_/102-7992459-7899347

Getting a CD listed at Amazon yourself can be very expensive and costly. Amazon also takes a pretty big cut of the sale. But if someone has already listed your CD (either through CD Baby/Super D or as a private reseller) they've already done a lot of the hard stuff for you.

You won't have much luck getting your CD completely removed from Amazon. Anyone can set up a reseller account and list your CD if they have it. Even if you removed it from the CD Baby/Super D program completely, your CD can still be listed by anyone who has a copy to sell.

Likewise, you can't prevent people from selling used copies or undercutting your price. That's the free market for ya.

Regarding the outlandish resale prices: this seems to be the "official" Harvey Auctions website:

http://harveyauctions.gemm.com/

They sell at eBay, Half.com and a bunch of other sites, too.

All CDs are listed at $39.99. It just doesn't make sense. The only thing I can think of is, with thousands of CDs offered across all those sites, multiplied by millions of visitors, all they need is for a few people to buy CDs at the inflated price each day and they make a big profit. Weird, but I don't know if it's illegal.

Here's an example of what I'm talking about:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B000CAEDRE/ref=dp_olp_1/102-7992459-7899347

The first listing ($8.00) is me. Amazon chooses the lowest offered price to display on the product page, so my price is the "offical" price shown.

Good idea Scott

That'll take the wind out of their "sales"

I know for a fact that Harvey Auctions does not have my physical cd. If someone orders it from them they in turn have to either buy it from me personaly, buy it from Amazon, or buy it from cdbaby. Either way I will get my cut unless they downloaded it and made a copy which is illegal. I still go with Mike D's theory that they are hoping that I will see their ad and order the expensive copy to see if it is real. If I did that they would make 40 bucks from me and I would make 5 bucks from them, and I end up buying my own cd for 40 bucks.How many cd's is Harvey Auctions selling of well known artists at that price? Ben

Thanks, Scott...Your advice is really helpful.
I really didn't want to set up an Amazon account, but I might now...just to sell my CD's "direct from the artist."

Emily

Nothing of mine is being offered on Amazon by anyone. I might consider setting up my own.
But I was curious how it all worked so I checked some well known artists.
Looking at The Dixie Chicks I found.

120 merchants selling their CD "Take The Long Way" new and used
Prices range from $7.55 to about $12.95 with one merchant as high as $18.99

The CD is selling at Best Buy for $13.99

I am curious as to how these merchants can be selling a new factory sealed CD for under $8.00 and be able to make a profit.
The wholesale price from a distributor has got to be at least that high.
Could these be bootlegged copies? If so you would think the law would be all over it.
Curious

Bill, they are probably what the retail industry calls "loss leaders." You have a very small number of items (maybe as few as one) that you offer at a deep discount to get people in the door, whereupon you can peddle 'em something at the Real Price.

I did the books for a hotel that had a huge neon sign up that you could see from the freeway proclaiming "Room $49.00." And they did have one. Only one. The rest of the rooms rented for $95-125 a night. If somebody showed up and wanted a $49 room, we'd rent 'em that one if it was available. More often than not, it wasn't.

There is one computer mega-store in the Portland (OR) area that took Loss Leadership one step further--they deliberately advertise things they don't have, and have no intention of having, to get people to come. Amazon may well be doing the same thing--and it being the Internet, you really have no way to tell.

I was trying today to book my daughter a Spring Break flight to see her aunt down in Arizona. Roughly a dozen airlines were advertising flights as low as $178 round trip--but when you tried to make a reservation, the price came in over $1,000. What happened to the cheap tickets? "I'm sorry, we don't have any of those available." Just because somebody is advertising an $8 CD does not mean you can get one.

The Artist Formerly Known as Moonless Joe

Yep Joe
Good thought. I had used the loss leader myself in the past in my remodeling business. Usually an item that was rarely used or would need something much more profitable to install it.

Hi everyone,
I am a third-party seller of new and used music CDs on Amazon and other similar venues. I also sell CDs on my own web sites.

I find this thread interesting and thought I could add my viewpoint and hopefully help some of you get a better grasp of what is happening on Amazon.

First, I only sell original CDs. No pirated copies, CDRs or bootlegs. I have over 50,000 CDs in my inventory. I have bought them mainly from music stores that have gone out of business. There may be a few sellers on Amazon who do sell CDRs, but from my experience they are thrown off pretty quickly. Amazon and other sellers all want to protect the value of their merchandise.

No offense, but if somebody was going to take the time to sell a pirated copy of a CD, they would probably sell top-40 music that sells quickly. That is the primary reason I have difficulty believing there is any pirating of the music artists on this thread are making.

On the topic of price arbitrage - where third-party sellers who have no physical stock, receive an order and then order it from CD Baby or wherever to fill the order - This does happen but is much more common on Amazon UK, Amazon Japan, Amazon Germany, etc. A seller will get a data feed from a low-price site, like Amazon US or eBay and then list those titles on Amazon Germany where the prices are much higher and where there may not be enough supply. Once they receive the order they will buy it and then re-ship it to the original buyer in Germany.

Price arbitrage is against Amazon's rules, but it is fairly common. The best defense is to become a seller on these sites yourself and underprice these guys. Of course, you might also just think of these people as extra salesmen for your product. They find the customer, pay the price you are asking, and handle the transaction.

Somebody here was amazed their CD was selling for $40 on Amazon. As a third party seller I often end up with hard-to-find CDs that nobody else has for sale on Amazon. Millions of people visit Amazon each month. How many people visit your site each month? If somebody is looking for your CD they are likely to start with Amazon and not have the patience or even know how to find your CD anywhere else. So if they find it on Amazon they are likely to buy it there. Of course price is an issue. I know some sellers start their price for these types of titles at $100 and go down a little bit each month. I happen to start mine at $16.98 if nobody else has the same title.

Somebody commented that their mom already has their CD so who else is left to buy it for $40? Well, how about your old college roomates? Or a buddy from work? Or an old girlfriend? Or an old fan? I have sold CDs to all these people who email me and say how excited they are to finally find a copy of that music they used to enjoy so much.

This is why you all should set up seller accounts on Amazon and sell your CDs there as third-party sellers. It is free to start. Amazon takes 15% plus $1.00 for each sale. Write in the description that you are the artist and that you are selling the CD. People generally want to support artists and will probably choose you even if your CD is priced a bit more than other sellers.

I am a Pro-Merchant with Amazon. Among other things that means I can create listings myself for CDs I have in stock but that are not in Amazon's database. There are tens of thousands of pro merchants on Amazon who can create new listings on Amazon. This may account for some listings that you or your label did not specifically authorize.

How do those people sell new CDs for less than the wholesale price? Well I guarantee they are not loss-leaders. That might work for Best Buy or Wal-Mart, but not on Amazon. Customers just don't care much about who is selling the CD, and they likely won't be a repeat customer unless you are the lowest priced on the next one they buy. So there are two places those low-priced new CDs are coming from: music stores that close or liquidate their stock and promos. There have been hundreds of retailers that have closed in the past year that sold all of their stock for pennies on the dollar. Pennies. That might have included some of your CDs. In those situations the label/artist should have been paid the regular wholesale price when the store originally bought them. The store takes the loss. For all intents and purposes they are "previously owned" but still have the original packaging so they are sold as "new" on Amazon by many sellers.

Promos account for a large number of the new releases that are sold by third-party sellers on Amazon. Think about it: radio station employees are low-paid - especially public radio employees who many of you send promos to. By sending them a perfectly good CD you are providing a temptation that is beyond the threshold of many people. Public radio stations get boxes of CDs every day. They can't keep them all. Even if they give them to their members, those CDs will eventually end up on the market. Please please please - make your promo CDs unsaleable by removing the artwork completely. Holepunches, writing on the art, cuts in the spine - none of that keeps a promo CD off the market. It is hurting your sales on Amazon probably more than any other factor when you send out a bunch of perfectly good CDs to reviewers.

I hope this gives you a bit of insight. If you have any questions feel free to email me or post them here where the answers can be shared with others.

Mark
mark@marktatum.com

Hi, Mark,

I appreciate your explanations. Thanks for taking the time to share your experiences with everyone here. I will probably do as you suggested - set up an account on Amazon with a description to "buy direct from the artist."

I have sold many of my CD's to people at performances and on CD Baby, NOT through stores. In fact, the guy that is selling my CD's "new" is from the heart of Nashville, and also is a third party seller on Amazon, as you are. The only way that he could have
"new" CD's of mine would be to collect unopened CD's from everyone who has purchased my CD!!!! I monitor my CD Baby sales pretty carefully...Interestingly, at my request, as part of my desire to get ot the bottom of this, someone I know just pruchased a "new" CD from this guy at Amazon, and on the site it is now saying that there are no more of my "new" CD's in stock. Yes, the sale did not turn up on my CD Baby site either. I can only guess that the CD is not REALLY new. I suppose, as you say, these people collect promo CD's ...so I guess there could be a few of mine out there.

Please be specific - other than taking off the artwork - which is quite distinctive on my CD's - are there any other ways to make the CD unsaleable? Thanks again for your insights and for sharing valuable information.

Emily

Hi Emily,
I understand how an arist or a label would want the reviewer to get the best impression possible of their product. Artwork has always been an important part of the whole package when selling music, and you spend lots of time and creativity on it. So when sending promotional CDs you naturally want to include the artwork that goes with it, that makes it whole.

As a seller, I know that I cannot sell anything without artwork. So that was my first suggestion - just take it all out. I also cannot sell a CDR without the danger of bad feedback from my customers. I have seen promo CDs with regular art and a CDR instead of a CD. This might not stop some sellers though, or they might not even notice.

For promo CDs definitely remove all the wrapping (might make it easier for reviewers to pop it in a player too) so at least it can't be sold as "new." Damage the artwork significantly - cut off half the back insert for example. Many labels ship promos with just a generic back insert, a track list and no barcode. Some have black & white photocopies of the artwork. I can't sell those either. Always cut off or leave off the barcode for promo cds. That at least will get the seller to question whether it is a promo or not. Holepunches mean nothing (Amazon specifically allows cds with hole-punched barcodes). Writing in marker can be removed. Stickers can be removed.

Most sellers care about their feedback and are trying to build a good reputation. So if you make your promo cd "damaged" enough so they cannot sell it without the potential of receiving bad feedback, that is the idea.

Even more promo cds end up on eBay, where there really are no guidelines, but feedback is even more important for sellers.

When I buy a few thousand cds at a time, a certain number of them will be promo cds. As I go through and inspect them I am trying to determine if they are a promo or not. Frankly, I cannot always tell. Do yourself a favor and leave no doubt.

I am sharing all this info with you because ultimately promo cds hurt my sales too.

You may believe that it is worth the price of a few CDs to get somebody's attention to review your music. After all, there is a limited number of promos that you send out. That is probably a rational choice. Don't complain though when they show up on Amazon.

This turned into another long post. Hope it helps!

Mark

Thanks, Mark,

I just learned a lot. I never thought that my promo CD's would turn up on Amazon...I bet that's what happened. The fact that the guy who is selling mine is from Nashville makes sense, too, as I sent lots of CD's to various people in that area when it was first released.

You gave me many things to think about, and undoubtedly helped many others as well. I sincerely appreciate it

Emily

I though most music stores accept their music on consignment and if it doesn't sell,they just return it to the owner or supplier for credit.

Not in all cases Everett....only generally true for less established artists where sales are unpredictable....and there are a host of arrangements in between that depend on the product and the buyer' power relative to the seller's power, which determines return policies, prices, selling terms etc...

And as far as the CD's appearing from thin air, sometimes that duck really IS a duck. Don't discount the manufacturer producing more than contracted for and selling them out the back door. Not saying this IS the case here, but it IS a historical fact...and once these items enter the mainstream channels, really, who's to know their provenance?

Some distributors will allow returns on certain titles, or offer some incentive to stock it. It may be that these stores that were going bankrupt had lost some of their clout with distributors, or the new CDs were just those they had bought. Retailers and distributors all take on significant risk when stocking a new CD for sale. It appears that risk is spread among the artist, label, distributor and store to bring music to the marketplace. The amount of risk taken on probably has something to do with reputation and ability to sell at each of these levels. For example, a distributor might be willing to take on more of the risk of stocking a title if it is going to a store that he knows can move that type of product.

If a label does make more of a title than the market can bear at the initial price point, then they eventually begin discounting them. This is how "cutouts" end up on the market. Distributors will mark the CDs with a cut or hole so they know what wholesale price they sold it for if it is returned to them (usually cutouts cannot be returned).

Returned CDs can be redistributed or destroyed. Check eBay for wholesale lots of new CDs that have been sold by the pallet by a distributor or label for pennies each and are being resold in smaller batches.

I am making generalizations as there seems to be all kinds of variations on deals for retailers and distributors. I find all of this very interesting as it is a window into how the market works.

Mark

This has been a very interesting thread, thanks Mark for chiming in with your thoughts of experience.

Herbie

Perhaps this no brainer might be of help. When sending out a promo, stamp cd and artwork thus PROMO ONLY NOT FOR RE-SALE a rubber stamp and indelible ink is not expensive.

Just checked since there was so many interesting remarks here, and only one of my CD's (Train of Love - 2001) is listed. Some people on amazon say they are selling new 'still shrink wrapped' CDs. Where they got them, who knows? They're selling them for $3.95 new & 99 cents used. I don't have enough fight left to investigate, but I do note the highest amount is from Tennessee. Since so many people mentioned Tennessee, it would be interesting to see what kind of bootlegging they're doing out there nowadays.

Heck, it's hard enough for me to convince my friends to listen to my CDs anymore, why the heck would someone order them from a stranger? The cool thing I see is that at least Amazon is offering one of the cuts for free download (Ain't No Christmas In Hell). I can't see where Amazon benefits at all from that, and this way people are forewarned before turning $$$ over to a bootlegger.

Ask this - why would someone be dumb enough to bootleg an album that is listed as #888,728 on the charts? It's hard to imagine anyone that dumb having anything worth sueing them for.

Re: post by Mark Tatum - Very interesting points. I get 7-8 CDs for review here every day, and I have never thought of selling them. I always throw away the artwork & boxes, but the CDs sit up on a shelf here in spindles. I have considered giving them away for different things - like "name this tune & win 5 random CDs", or "by the sampler and receive a random CD from my review stack". What I haven't considered is the fact that the recipient may turn around and sell the promo CD. I'm guessing that's not illegal - once it's given, I assume the recipient can do whatever they want with it?

So, now I'm thinking it's probably best not to give the promo CDs away. I would never sell them myself, it just doesn't feel ethical. But, if I give them away, what stops others from selling them?

The thing is, I thought by giving away the promos that are sitting here anyway - that at least someone would hear them. Guess my best option at this point is to ask a few of the artists their opinion on my giving their promos away to strangers. Never thought of that, but your posting is giving me reason to think and wonder - thanks!

I have some insight on why unknown obscure titles end up on these sites. Assuming the premise (which I beleive is true), that they take the order, buy your cd from cd baby, and then ship it.

There are thousands of cd's sold on CD baby. It would take thousands of hours to read through them and decide which ones are worth reselling. It's much easier to have a special program that reads the CD baby listings, format them into Amazon format and automatically post them onto amazon. It's easy to even have the program 'type' the ads in. Some websites foil this automated posting by making the user type in what letters he sees and shows a box with 4-6 letters that are hard to read (and therefore impossible for automatic OCR - optical character recognition)

So the reason an unknown low/no selling CD is included is because it would be harder to weed it out.

Some fool is also selling my first CD on Amazon for $39. This was long before streaming, so I have no idea how my music reached the hands of this idiot.

Good suggestion to post a 'review' saying that the product was copyright infringement.

LL.

I, too, appear to be on sale at Amazon. Not worried about the factory sealed new CD for 45 bucks but the used one listed as “CD ONLY -- missing case inserts. Excellent condition. Ships same day” for 8 bucks makes me go hmmnn.

Well....After my earlier posts here....Someone I knew tried to buy my CD from Amazon...and..she received an email this week saying they didn't have it in stock...hmm....I wonder if that has anything to do with the fact that I wrote a long email to Amazon stating my concern over illegal copying of my CD...asking for them to take my CD off of Amazon.........will keep you posted...

Emily

So, all this bootlegging discussion aside, how about links to those German Porn sites?

Robert:
Are you sure you want to go there?

(says in his best Homer Simpson voice)

"Mmmmmmm... German porn!"

OK, now I'm bummed I can't find that website again, but just believe me, it would have melted your eyeballs out

b-lieve it or not, just found out my 2 CD's, ......BTW and S.T.A.T.!, are for sale at Amazon, for like $15 apiece; at CDbaby.com, they are selling for less than $12 a pop. somethin's fishy in the boat and it ain't the cargo.


markus
stat songs publishing, ltd. (ascap)
www.soundclick.com/markusky
www.myspace.com/markusky
statsongs@hotmail.com

Good advice I'm going to do this when I start selling my own music.

Christine,

I think the same thing happened to me...I also have various people selling my CD for a penny or for $39.99.

I have since learned that I need to alter the appearance of the CD's ( take of labels and art) I send out for PR purposes, so they won't end up on somebody's site for dishonest profit.

Emily

Sorry for Necro-posting and bringing this out of the dead, but I've been watching the listing of one of my CDs on Amazon (not both) and waiting breathlessly for the downloads to finally arrive and under cut it (it was one of these $39 jobs). Well, tonight when I did the search, it had one of those "People who searched for 'Bryan Baker' ultimately bought:" boxes (and you may have guessed by now it was the $39 listing. I KNOW that only 3 copies of that CD ever sold via CD Baby so far (embarrassing, but true) and I know all of the purchasers personally (at least they aren't family). Anyway, If they have actually made a sale, they had to get it from somewhere, and I know where all copies have gone (and they specifically list it new).

I had a nice chat with a customer service rep, who was going to get me to a vendor support rep, but that dpt was closed for the night. I'll see where this leads tomorrow I guess.

Well, the good news is it looks like my downloads and physical CDs are now both available through Amazon direct (via CD-Baby), at normal prices, so the situation should correct itself.