US album sales continue to slump, despite digital growth
Nielsen SoundScan has released mid-year data on the US music market, and they reveal that album sales are continuing to fall - an 11% drop compared to the first half of last year. That’s 204.6 million units sold in the first six months of 2008, with CD sales falling 16.3% while digital album sales increased 34.4%. Digital sales now account for 15.4% of album sales in the US. Meanwhile, individual digital track sales rose 30% in the period to 523.7 million units in the first half of this year. In terms of market share, UMG is top dog with 31.2%, followed by Sony BMG (24.8%), WMG (20.8%) and EMI (9.4%), while independent labels tallied 13.9% collectively. Of those, only WMG and the indies increased their market share compared to last year.
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