NARM Releases Annual Survey Results For 1998Retailersí Internet Activities Profiled For The First Time

The National Association of Recording Merchandisers (NARM) has released its Annual Survey Results. All figures reported are for the 1998 business year. NARM retail and rack jobber members had another strong sales year. Gross dollar volume for all music products grew by 10 percent to $9.69 billion, with the CD album market (83.3 percent or $8.1 billion) continuing to build on its dominance. DVD sales, which showed great potential in 1997, literally exploded in 1998 - up a staggering 400 percent to $259 million. ""Our Annual Survey is the Associationís most valuable source of industry data and its most frequently requested statistical report,"" said President Pamela Horovitz. ""We are especially excited to be including for the first time a profile of the Internet activities of our brick and mortar retail members this year. Itís extremely important that we begin benchmarking the e-commerce activities of our members, so we asked how theyíre marketing and using their Web sites, how theyíre handling fulfillment, whatís selling, and their downloading plans.""A total of 32 member companies are included in the 1998 Annual Survey Results. Questionnaires were mailed out in the first quarter of 1999 to home entertainment retailers and rack jobbers. Responses were tabulated for NARM by Soundata. Data on consumers was supplied by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). NARM serves the music and other prerecorded entertainment software industry as the pre-eminent forum for insight and dialogue for its more than 1,100 member retailers, wholesalers, distributors, entertainment software suppliers, and suppliers of related products and services. For more information, contact Jim Donio at 609 596 2221.