More news from Danza y Movimiento ...
Dear friends of Caribbean and South American Music!
Today, we would like to give you a some information on our offers as well as some comments on the numerous reactions on our last newsmail.
First of all, we would like to inform all our Spanish speaking customers or those who would like to learn the language, that our shop does also exist in Spanish now. Just click the little Spanish flag next to the German, English and Italian one on the left side of our homepage. This is the direct link to the Spanish shop:
www.danzaymovimiento.com/shop/default.php?language=es
There are also news concerning our travel pages: You can take classes in photography in Havana and Santiago de Cuba again. You can book the course all year, but the group has to consist of at least 6 persons who apply at the same time. More information:
www.dym-travel.com/en_foto
We were pleased by the quite controversial reactions on our last newsmail. Thank you very much for your comments!!!
The topic “prices of music CDs” is a really tricky subject at the moment. People do not only save money in Germany, but they are also proud to be stingy now because of an advertising campaign with the headline “stinginess is groovy”! Only few people know, that exactly this company which makes propaganda for stinginess is responsible for the disappearance of the majority of small German specialized music dealers.
Many of you encouraged us to follow up our company policies including intensive service for our customers. We try to do our very best and we hope that you recommend us to other people a lot. There were quite a few critical comments on the CD prices.
One customer wrote:
“ ... I have to admit that I do copy a lot of my tango CDs for friends and that I also appreciate copied CDs as a gift from them. 20 Euro or more for a recording from 1938, in which case I will surely not make any of the musicians happy with royalties and where the “sound restauration” does no help a lot, to me seems to be exaggerated. I cannot understand this price.”
We understand this point. If remastered tango CDs would be mass-productions, the price would surely be too high. But they are not. Most labels producing remastered CDs use their profits - if there are any - for the support of new artists. This is what we do for example. As far as my experience goes, there are no labels selling “niche music” like Tango which earn a lot of money. These companies are run by idealists, who don’t care about money anyway and who only invest in their projects.
Another customer writes:
“In my opinion, approx. 15 Euro for a new CD IS FAR TOO MUCH. In this case I don’t care if we are cheaper compared to other industrial nations. BECAUSE: I buy my CDs in Brazil for a prize 1/3 - 1/4 cheaper than in Germany AND I know how much the production of a CD costs, because a) I am a musician myself and b) our singer works in a CD production company.
And this is why I cannot understand why the record industry or THE SHOPS offer CDs for a price many times over the costs - when nowadays everybody can copy a CD at home for approx. 1 Euro ( incl. the cover print).
IT’S YOUR OWN FAULT THAT THE CD SALES NUMBERS SINK IN SUCH AN EXTREMELE WAY ... instead of paying 15.- Euro for a CD, I wait for a short while and then I get the DVD for the same price (or for less)! I am curious to know when the industry will finally learn.”
We are not the industry! Even if we sell products of major labels (Sony, BMG, Warner etc). Though, we do have to pay very high prices in order to supply the CDs and thus we should sell some CDs of some small distributor or exotic label for something like 50 Euro.
The price for new productions would have to be 100 Euro per CD in order to recoup our costs.
Our prices are a minimum consensus in order to be able to work economically at a minimum level. If you like to support us, do it with without obligation. If you find the prices too high, feel free to copy the CDs. Some people really don’t have the money, others think that stinginess is groovy, and others are not aware of the fact that creativity costs money.
Many regards Matthias Möbius
