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We got a tip this morning from a reader who saw copies of the Eagles' Long Road Out Of Eden at the Times Square Virgin Megastore yesterday, and a little detective work by Rolling Stone confirms: the so-called Wal-Mart "exclusive" has been spotted in the racks of other record stores, often at a substantial markup from the Sam Walton-approved price of $11.88. (Hey, they have to make some profit.)
The best part: The only store that was willing to 'fess up to getting its inventory at the big-box store was a small shop in Nebraska, while a Virgin clerk, when asked whether or not the albums were imports, whispered to RS he "thinks they were hard to get." Which implies either a long car ride or some weird hand-off system because the Virgin clerk didn't want to be seen actually shopping at Wal-Mart. The albums apparently just started popping up in stores today, so what this means for Eden's SoundScan tallies is still up in the air; given that Wal-Mart bought those three million albums from the Eagles on a no-returns basis, though, one might suspect that the powers that be in Arkansas are a bit alarmed by the way that their low prices are having the odd effect of cannibalizing their sales.
Breaking News: "Exclusive" Wal-Mart Eagles Album Not So Exclusive [RS]
Comments
for years we've used Wal-mart, Best Buy, CostCo etc. for "wholesale" purposes. The Soundscan question is an interesting one because, theoretically, there are sales being double reported. The big box chains are getting the sales so I'm not sure how much cannibalizing is taking place. Most of my customers have said they would rather wait than step into a Wal-mart. My customers, though, are gray-haired old farts (like me) who hold music to a higher standard beyond commodity. Since I'm a capitalist as well as a huge music fan I've made my piece with some of the compromises I have to make but my customers don't have to settle. I do their dirty work for them.
I'm guessing any sale of the Eagles disc reported from an account not affiliated with Wal-Mart will get dinged by SoundScan and removed from Billboard. They have failsafe measures in place to check for irregular shit, and this is even easier to spot than the usual shenanigans.
"My customers, though, are gray-haired old farts (like me) who hold music to a higher standard beyond commodity.
@leevilgenius: Why the fuck are they listening to the Eagles, then?
Wal-Mart is using the album as a loss leader anyway. So music stores that buy from Wal-Mart and resell the album are probably (over)charging it for the same price they would have anyway if they were able to get the album from a wholesaler.
Actually, the album was in Times Square Virign store on the day of release last week.
I just want to be sure I'm getting the slave labor made version of this "authentic" American "rock" album.
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