Record Store Day 2018 saw album sales increase by 33% year-on-year, according to Official Charts Company data for April 21.
Record Store Day organisers reported an overall increase in unit sales of 7% year-on-year as consumers moved towards album releases. It’s estimated that 60,000 LPs and 30,000 vinyl singles were sold.
Based on OCC figures, the estimated value of vinyl sales was up 16% compared to last year’s Record Store Day. The majority of the 240-plus shops taking part reported sales increasing by between 10% and 20% year-on-year.
“Finances wise, we were about 15% up on last year – a total which at the time we thought could not be surpassed,” said Jon Tolley of Banquet Records in Kingston. “Credit has to be passed to the labels and to ERA giving us fuller information at an earlier time so we could prep properly. On the day it was great. Of course the weather helped, and the campers had their usual Friday night party. But it’s great to see so many customers queuing and treasuring their new records. And of course, it means people were forced to come into the shop they might often walk past. While RSD Saturday was hands down our busiest day of the year, Sunday was the second, Monday the third, Tuesday the fourth and so on. It’s a great shot in the arm for the books, a great advert for record shops, and a great buzz for customers.”
The revenue from Record Store Day will help our young shop immensely but the publicity and goodwill will last much longer
Rachel Lowe, Vinyl Revolution
Record Store Day, which marked its 10th anniversary in the UK this year, has played a major role in the vinyl revival and continues to attract new stores to the campaign.
Rachel Lowe, of Brighton store Vinyl Revolution, said: “Our first Record Store Day exceeded all expectations, it was the best day we’ve had since opening and was terrific fun. We opened our door to a long queue of regular customers but the day’s events (live BBC radio show, live music outside the shop and support and promotion from neighbouring shops) attracted a ton of new customers too. Our youngest first time record buyers were aged four and six. The revenue from Record Store Day will help our young shop immensely but the publicity and goodwill will last much longer. A fabulous day. Roll on next year!”
Drew Hill, MD of distributor Proper Music Group, told Music Week they put in a “tremendous team effort” to fulfil the RSD orders for the day.
“We shipped over 36,000 records ahead of the event and will continue to ship more out as shops are continuing to satisfy the demand for all these amazing releases,” he said. “Interestingly, we’ve heard from a couple of shops that they did more business on RSD Saturday than the whole of December. Talk about Christmas coming early!”
According to Music Week’s charts analysis, vinyl singles sales were down on the same week in 2017 by 30.65%. However, the focus of RSD has shifted towards albums and the sales boost helped several LPs make an appearance in the official album chart (April 27), including David Bowie’s Welcome To The Blackout (Live London ’78) at No.22.
There were also chart appearances for new vinyl releases of Pink Floyd’s The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn and The Courteeners' debut album St. Jude, as well as The National’s Boxer: Live In Brussels. Arcade Fire’s eponymous 2013 EP made the Top 75 for the first time after being released on blue vinyl for RSD. Fifteen albums sold upwards of 1,000 copies on vinyl, compared to eight following last year’s Record Store Day.
The Top 20 RSD singles and albums are below, though any sales rundown does also reflect the varying quantities issued for each vinyl release.
RSD 2018 - ALBUMS TOP 20
1 WELCOME TO THE BLACKOUT - LIVE LONDON 78 - DAVID BOWIE
2 ARCADE FIRE - ARCADE FIRE
3 THE PIPER AT THE GATES OF DAWN - PINK FLOYD
4 NOW - DAVID BOWIE
5 BOXER - LIVE IN BRUSSELS - THE NATIONAL
6 SUEDE - SUEDE
7 ST JUDE - COURTEENERS
8 TEN RAPID - MOGWAI
9 DAVID BOWIE - DAVID BOWIE
10 THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT - THE WHO
11 MIXED UP - THE CURE
12 THEIR SATANIC MAJESTIES REQUEST - THE ROLLING STONES
13 MADONNA - MADONNA
14 TORN DOWN - MIXED UP EXTRAS - THE CURE
15 GREATEST HITS - BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN
16 YOU CAN DANCE - MADONNA
17 MARCHIN' ALREADY - OCEAN COLOUR SCENE
18 1999 - PRINCE
19 ROXY - TONIGHT'S THE NIGHT LIVE - NEIL YOUNG
20 LIVE AT SIN-E - JEFF BUCKLEY
RSD 2018 - SINGLES TOP 20
1 ROCK AND ROLL - LED ZEPPELIN
2 LET'S DANCE - DAVID BOWIE
3 MYSTERY OF LOVE - SUFJAN STEVENS
4 IT'S A BEAUTIFUL WORLD - NOEL GALLAGHER'S HIGH FLYING
5 LIGHTS OF HOME - U2
6 SAY HELLO WAVE GOODBYE - SOFT CELL
7 PEOPLE WILL ALWAYS NEED COAL - PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCASTING
8 LAZY SUNDAY - SMALL FACES
9 THE WEIGHT OF HISTORY - BRIAN ENO & KEVIN SHIELDS
10 DON'T SET THE WORLD ON FIRE - RAG’N'BONE MAN
11 MANNISH BOY - JIMI HENDRIX
12 YOU ARE THE PROBLEM HERE - FIRST AID KIT
13 YOU EARNED THE RIGHT TO BE A DICK - SPARKS
14 CITY LOOKS PRETTY - COURTNEY BARNETT
15 ROXANNE - THE POLICE
16 DON'T DELETE THE KISSES - WOLF ALICE
17 WIDE OPEN SPACE - MANSUN
18 NORMANDY (ON A BEACH) - WATERFRONT (STONE ROSES)
19 HOW BIG THE SPACE - STEVEN WILSON
20 HEROES - MOTORHEAD
FOLLOW 
