Bandcamp has opened up its vinyl pressing service to a much wider swath of artists on its service. First launched in 2019 in a pilot program to a small group of artists, now Bandcamp has sent out invites to 10,000 members of their community.
The crowdfunding initiative allows artists to raise money for pressing a release to vinyl using pre-orders without putting up all of the money upfront. In the process Bandcamp coordinates production, ships the records to fans, fulfills digital, and handles customer support. Artists have complete control of design and pricing.
To get your order off the ground, Bandcamp needs to press a minimum of 250 records. So the financial goal needs to cover that, plus other expenses for vinyl mastering, packaging etc. Artists have 30 days to reach your goal.
In the 50 pilot projects done so far, Bandcamp has shipped 13,000 records to fans in 65 countries. In a broader sense, two million vinyl records were sold on Bandcamp in 2020 (this author bought a few of those for Bandcamp Fridays).
This allows artists with very little extra cash or without label backing to press more music to vinyl, especially when there is demand for it. With all of this extra music being pressed to vinyl, we hope it is being done in an environmentally manner since vinyl traditionally can be bad for the environment, though the financial benefits are undeniable.
