Vinyl rises 47% for first Record Store Day Drop

Shops were allowed to list RSD inventory directly online

Last week we reported that the vinyl record market is expected to grow over the next five years. Those findings couldn’t be more true as Discogs releases sales data from the first Record Store Day (RSD) Drop of 2020. Orders and vinyl purchases on Discogs over the first Record Store Day weekend were up in 2020 compared to past years.

Discogs saw 60,571 orders last weekend compared to 42,929 in for RSD 2019, a 41.1% increase. This translates to even more individual records: 78,680 sold in 2020 so far, up 47.12% from 53,481 sold in 2019. Shops were allowed to list RSD inventory directly online for the first time ever this year due to COVID-19 social distancing restrictions still in place worldwide.

Historically, Record Store Day falls in April. However, for 2020, RSD takes place across three special, socially distanced events on August 29th, September 26th, and October 24th. That means three days of different drops to allow stores to accommodate smaller crowds.

Consumers are buying tons of records, and not just RSD releases. So far this year, Discogs has witnessed a massive increase in vinyl sales. Over 5.8 million records were sold between January and June, which is up 33.73% compared to the same period in 2019, according to our recently released 2020 Mid-Year Report.

Buddy Iahn
Buddy Iahn

Buddy Iahn founded The Music Universe when he decided to juxtapose his love of web design and music. As a lifelong drummer, he decided to take a hiatus from playing music to report it. The website began as a fun project in 2013 to one of the top independent news sites. Email: info@themusicuniverse.com