The music industry, it is a-changin'. Especially around the Christmas season, when we audiophiles go out shopping for our fellow music-loving friends. A study done by the BPI, a trade body that oversees the music industry in the UK, shows that a majority of survey-takers would indeed enjoy music as a gift for the holidays. One change that continues however is what format they would prefer that music in.
Hard copies of albums have always been the preferred form of giving an album as a gift (it's nice to hold something in your hand, ya know?), but digital music has continued to make strides. The findings from 2013 indicate that 25 percent of the surveyed would prefer music gifts be in digital form. As could be expected, the rate is highest among younger consumers, with 55 percent of 15-19 year-olds opting for digital, and 58 percent for 20-24 year-olds.
"Digital music" refers to both download vouchers for services such as iTunes (19 percent) and subscriptions to streaming services such as Spotify (6 percent). Older folks such as myself (the 25-29 age range) still prefer physical copies of music however, whether that be CD (57 percent), vinyl records (7 percent...this is also our personal favorite format...just in case you're shopping for us. We know it doesn't sound better with modern music, we just like the big album art) or record tokens (basically an old world term for a record store gift card in the UK. They can be redeemed for a record. That makes up 11 percent).
Of course, these numbers reflect strictly on the UK, however as we've seen with previous studies on things such as album sales and format trends, the U.S. very much mirrors its cousins across the pond. If you're looking for a last minute gift, just remember that 62 percent of people wouldn't mind a record.
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