The Near-Mint Vinyl Initiative is being spearheaded by Republic of Music and the AIM Climate Action Group and is fully supported by PIAS and Music Declares Emergency. To see the Near Mint panel hosted by MDE and Rough Trade as part of the Turn Up The Volume week of music industry action in April '21 click here
The initiative aims to reduce waste – environmental, financial and time – by having a uniform policy across independent retail, labels and distributors whereby if a piece of vinyl is received by a store with superficial damage to the sleeve i.e. in near-mint condition, it is not simply returned as faulty and scrapped as non-saleable, but rather a standard percentage markdown is given to the store and it is sold through as near-mint to the customer. The percentage markdown which will be used is likely to be 10%.
For [PIAS] distributed releases, labels would manually manage the process, and their Sales Team would have final say on whether a record falls under the near-mint definition (details below).
This is a very positive step for the industry. Labels, together with the AIM climate action group, will be working closely with distributors and retail partners to ensure there is a uniform approach. We encourage you to give the scheme your backing, and also to encourage your artists to push the positive message of the ’Near-Mint’ scheme which will, hopefully, reach the people we need to have on board to make the scheme a success - the shops’ customers. At a time when the industry is seeing increased demand for vinyl, and the attendant issues in supply, it would be heartening if they were able to limit the number of perfectly good records which are scrapped, whilst simultaneously having a positive environmental impact.
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