Reminder: This Is the Last Week Bundles Count for Billboard

[Pop Art 1,634]

"As for merchandise/album bundles, beginning Oct. 9, no further sales of albums can be reported if bundled with merchandise, even if the album and merchandise are available à la carte. Albums scheduled for release on or before Oct. 8 can report sales generated from the bundles, but only through Oct. 8." (Source)

Just a PSA that today through Thursday October 8 will be the last week merch bundles (well, as we know them at least) will count for Billboard charts, so be sure to get in any last minute Chromatica album bundle orders you've been sitting on!

[alicefromabove 6,588]

Ok but Queen is still #2 

[GreenDiamond 5,609]

thanks god done with those dumb money grabbing tactics for no1

[Lazzarus 2,137]

the end of an era, thankfully 

[HausOfAntonio 3,793]

Should keep the rule for Gaga and scrap it for everyone else 

[QueenGaga 3,444]

Bye Bye Taylulu we all know why you released Folklore this year after the bundle announcement by billboard 

[Dulo Peep 8,717]

Chromatica dodged a bullet

[mr.peter 2,818]

I kinda liked the trend of selling a merch item and attaching a album to it. It gave music fans lots of cool merch. Now sales are gonna be even more sh!tty 

[CHROMATICON 2,067]

This makes me think Gaga will 100% focus on streaming from now on. Chromatica sales would have been pretty weak without bundles. 

[S0436 9,500]

[KORG 1,817]

Its quite clear theyll just package it as the album + free merch

[Adarsh 26,211]

On 10/3/2020 at 4:55 AM, CHROMATICON said:

Chromatica sales would have been pretty weak without bundles. 

Just like literally everyone else in the business these days 

Edited October 7, 2020 by Adarsh

[OMonster 10,782]

I'm confused by the power and influence of bundles. 

If someone is going to buy, say, a t-shirt from Lady Gaga's store... they'd surely be buying the album somewhere along the line, anyway? The same goes for a concert ticket?

So, remove the bundling - fine - but those who took part in bundles will still, largely, buy the album... so what's the problem?

Is this to stop repeat purchases of the same album?

As in - an album sale will only count as an album sale if it is purchased on its own?

Again... the kind of fans that enjoy merch will probably buy multiple copies of an album (separately) anyway... with or without a bundle 

And the whole idea that bundling invalidates the success of an album is so odd to me. 

I mean, if so many people wanted to buy merch or concert tickets for a particular artist... that's surely a good indication of that artist's popularity? Thus, a decent charting album makes sense anyway and isn't a 'force representation'. 

It all seems quite backwards. In the age of streaming, music labels *have* to put extra incentives on album purchases. It doesn't mean they're 'forcing' interest - they're just trying to monetise interest that's already there. 

But from a charts or 'perceived popularity' perspective - bundling really makes no difference. 

After all... if bundling works, it's only because the artist is popular.  

Spoiler

What I am a little bit more disagreeable about is when an artist releases six different versions of the exact same album... like Taylor. That, clearly, is misrepresenting sales. But an album attached to a hoodie or concert ticket - to me - is probably in line with an artist's actual popularity. 

 

Edited October 7, 2020 by OMonster

[Killa 11,489]

here's a fun game

let's bet how many more years (months) before no more physical releases

[Rio 4,806]

On 10/3/2020 at 12:10 AM, HausOfAntonio said:

Should keep the rule for Gaga and scrap it for everyone else 

I'm convinced this will work in Gaga's favour. She always sells high physical copies - she has more competition when others do bundle sales. I think...