Opinion: Bodily music outlets have an instrumental function to play for rising musicians
Roger Foxcroft, A Main Music Provides
It’s no secret that the world is transferring more and more on-line, and music isn’t any exception to that. From streaming companies changing vinyl and CDs to purchasing sheet music and devices on-line, I’ve witnessed the shift first-hand.
On the identical time, music schooling in colleges is in decline. An absence of funding and an ever-increasing concentrate on STEM topics over the humanities is letting our younger musicians down.
What we can not do is let music outlets disappear from our excessive streets. The subsequent era of musicians relies on them.
UK colleges are taking part in a bum word
It’s extensively recognised that musical schooling is useful for cognitive capacity. Studying an instrument comes with an intensive rap sheet of advantages, together with improved reminiscence, partaking numerous mind areas concurrently, and even improved social connection and more healthy psychological wellbeing.
But, based on Ofsted, the trajectory of music schooling lately has been one during which colleges have decreased key stage three (11-14 years) provision, and trainee major academics have been provided shrinking quantities of music coaching. The uptake of music schooling in key stage 5, the ultimate two years of secondary faculty schooling the place many pupils start to plan their future careers, has fallen during the last ten years.
At our music store, 40% of our enterprise was once with colleges – that quantity has fallen considerably. Actually, a 2025 report by impartial assume tank Demos recognized a £161.4m shortfall within the authorities’s price range for music schooling.
In Stoke-on-Trent, the place A Main relies and the place my youngsters stay, we struggled to seek out many colleges which even supply a music GCSE. Suggestions from colleges within the space exhibits they’re having to chop total topics, together with music, resulting from prices.
So, what does this imply for younger musicians? Restricted access to instruments and equipment, fewer lessons and studying alternatives, and lack of specialised academics.
Why do we want music outlets?
Bodily music outlets are under no circumstances a alternative for well-funded music schooling in colleges. What they do supply younger musicians is the chance to speak to specialists, since most music outlets are owned by musicians themselves.
They can provide tailor-made recommendation, demos of devices, and troubleshoot issues on the spot.
Musicians can achieve hands-on expertise with gear that they could by no means have seen earlier than. They will contact, play, and listen to devices. They will really feel the load of a guitar, take a look at the keys of a piano, or hear how a saxophone sounds in actual life.
Balancing the scales
For all these causes, it’s very important that music shops keep a bodily presence on UK excessive streets. That stated, having a strong digital presence isn’t simply useful, it’s a recreation changer for store house owners attempting to fill the gaps and preserve their enterprise transferring ahead.
For instance, highway works exterior the A Main retailer in 2024 brought on a noticeable dip in gross sales. With out an internet presence, occasions that restrict in-person gross sales will be detrimental to the enterprise.
There are clear advantages of an internet contact level for patrons. We inventory over 10,000 SKUs, and providing these on-line too means the client base instantly expands from individuals in your native space to musicians all around the nation. That enhance in gross sales helps the bodily enterprise financially.
One other profit is that clients can extra simply evaluate costs. It’s usually presumed that on-line giants like Amazon promote merchandise cheaper, so individuals don’t even trouble making the journey to the store. In our case, it’s most frequently not true. So, by itemizing our merchandise on-line, clients can clearly evaluate our inventory and costs with different sellers.
Aligning on-line and bodily presence
At present, our store strikes about an 80/20 revenue ratio, with 80% being in-person gross sales. It’s our purpose to deliver this to 50/50, so we will proceed to supply an important in-person service to clients, supporting younger musicians and people in search of skilled recommendation. In the meantime, we will construct an internet earnings stream which maintains monetary stability throughout quieter in-store intervals.
Final 12 months, we introduced on DMAC Media, a digital advertising and marketing company, to assist with the store’s web site. We wished clients to obtain the identical stage of professionalism and experience that A Main gives in our bodily retailer and attain a wider viewers than we’re capable of in particular person.
In a single 12 months, our on-line gross sales elevated by 17% and the worth of every order elevated by 12%. Classes rocketed by 109%, which means there’s extra individuals searching our merchandise and conscious of the enterprise after they’re able to make a purchase order. When revenue margins are minimal, this makes a big impact on our capacity to maintain the bodily retailer operating.
Bodily music outlets are very important for the music industry and for serving to fill the hole left by the decline in music schooling in colleges.
However they need to transfer with the occasions and recognise the function performed by having an internet presence.
These usually are not competing enterprise fashions; they’re complementary approaches to reaching the final word purpose – higher entry to musical schooling and devices.
