[78-L] Cost of buying records over time

[Michael Biel]

On 9/5/2011 4:45 PM, David Lennick wrote:
> I think he's more interested in general North American prices.
>
> dl

I am confused as to whether this Keith wants retail prices or 
aftermarket prices such as auctions or set-price sales of old records.  
The catalogs show the prices of all the records, not just the $7.00 
records, and the reference books like Read&Welch mention prices or show 
ads going all the way back to Berliners, and for the dime store and 
minor labels.  Same with cylinders back to the first brown wax.  I don't 
know why you don't have a handle on this.  There are price lists all 
over the place.  If you really are not sure I can pull some stuff out 
and quote them.

It is the aftermarket prices that have got me fascinated in the last 
couple of years.  Looking thru Record Changers of the 30s and 40s, want 
ads in American Music Lover/American Record Guide, Hollywood Premium 
Record Guide from 1948, Julian Morton Moses's price guide to American 
Celebrity Recordings also from 1948,  and even the want ads in The 
Gramophone before the web site fuzzed up the page scans, show some very 
interesting trends as to what was already rare while 78s were still in 
production.  This also is worthy of a study or an ARSC presentation 
(I'll pass it off to Cary since it relates to his Jazz Man Record Shop 
study).

Explain what you want.

Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com


On 9/5/2011 2:54 PM, bradc944 at comcast.net wrote:
>> Mike from Plovdiv sent me a note offline about original UK prices of the G&S Trial by Jury set I posted on 78rpmcommunity... granted this would have been in the 1920s/1930s, if you want I can re-paste...
>>
>> Brad
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: David Lennick<dlennick at sympatico.ca>
>>
>> A colleague has asked for a general idea of the cost of records going as far
>> back as possible. I know we all have catalogs and we all cite the $7 Victors
>> that people took as their freebees, but can we get a general idea per decade?
>> As to cylinders, I know nothing.
>>
>> On 9/5/2011 10:05 AM, Keith wrote:
>>> Hey David!
>>>
>>> I'm tuning up my university presentation and was thinking about showing the
>>> cost of buying a recording going back as far as possible. Do you have any
>>> catalogs etc. that show prices? I'm just looking for one ballpark price per
>>> decade. I have nothing that shows this 'cleanly' and am struggling for clues
>>> (one obviously clue is the price on a cylinder box). Let me know if you have
>>> any sources or ideas. A search through the Toronto Library didn't come up with
>>> anything worthwhile.
>> dl