An inside look at Detroit's Third Man Records
(CBS DETROIT) - Vinyl is back, and it's getting more popular by the year. So popular that record makers can't keep up.
A new report shows more vinyl records sold last year than CDs for the first time since 1987.
Forty-one million vinyl albums were sold last year, bringing in $1.2 billion, more than double what was spent on digital downloads.
Eddie Gillis manages the vinyl pressing plant at Third Man Records in Detroit. Since the state-of-the-art facility opened a few years back, business has been booming.
"It has definitely taken off. And it's not just one age bracket, it is all across the board," Gillis said.
From those adding to their original collections from back in the day to those who were barely born when the iPod took over.
"There's a lot of people my age who really like listening on vinyl, even though we didn't grow up listening to it," said vinyl collector Kelsey Stratman.
Vinyl collectors have their reasons for turning the tables on more modern music formats.
"People describe the warmth and just the feel that it gives you when you're listening to it - whether it be headphones or on a good sound system," Gillis said.
"There's definitely a kind of hunter gatherer kind of feel to it. And that excitement when you come across something you maybe haven't seen before you were even looking for just kind of discovering new stuff. It's super cool," said vinyl collector Eric Kass.
"It's definitely a more intentional experience than I mean, it's easier to just like throw on a Spotify playlist and just have it on in the background. But it's definitely like if I'm trying to listen to an album - record is probably the way to do it. To really pay attention to it," added Stratman.
As demand has gone up, the supply hasn't kept up. There's only a handful of vinyl pressing plants in the U.S. and most run a much smaller operation than Third Man Records - leading to to long wait times for the artists who often time the release of new music with whenever they can get it out on vinyl.
"Everybody wants their record at the same time... and every pressing plant is dealing with that line out the door," Gillis said. "Things that were released right now, let's say in this month, the planning started easily 12 to 18 months ago.
With high demand and low supply, why aren't more companies getting into the vinyl business?
"The last estimate was at least 200 more presses would be needed to kind of compensate for this this pent up demand. And the thing is where are you going to get the presses from? So, you have roughly three big companies that are making new vinyl presses in the world right now. And they can't make the presses fast enough," Gillis said.
Whether the major players get back in the game or not, it seems the vinyl record resurgence won't be skipping a beat anytime soon.
"We've had several people coming from different parts of the world to visit us and kind of become a little bit of a showroom for if you're going to build a pressing plant. You know, this is a this is a good place to come to see what do I need to do," Gillis said.
