How do you justify $125.00 for a new vinyl record

uberwaltz

.... I can agree with the sentiment in general on the ever increasing spiral of pricing on new and remastered lps.
Obviously demand and it being a still booming niche market has a big effect on pricing but $100+ for new records? ...

Parts of our little hobby have always been pricey, so it can be amusing when some object. That’s particularly true in this instance if you consider the facts.

The premium LP market really began around the mid-’70s with labels such as MoFi, Nautilus, and Sheffield, and coincided with the nascent hi-end audio industry that companies such as ARC and Mark Levinson were defining. At the time, most of those records cost around $20 - sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less. That was a lot of money back then, when the list price for a new LP was typically $6.98 and could be bought on sale at Sam Goody or Korvette’s for about $4.

Using the government’s inflation calculator, that $20 premium record in 1975 would cost about $100 today. So a two-LP box set at $125 isn’t such a crazy price. I’m sympathetic to those who think that price is too steep - I’ve never spent more than $50 for any LP - but it isn’t really accurate to claim it as an example of an "ever increasing spiral of pricing on new and remastered lps."
three_easy_payments

How do you justify the cost of anything that’s in the collectible market?

Exactly. It’s a collectible.

Easy. Even if I didn't think these releases are "worth it"on their own... go try to buy almost any out of print MFSL release. 

My local dealer sells MoFi albums. He still has one copy of Blood on the Tracks New for $149. I had a crazy moment some months ago and bought this Album from his store. A great pressing.

Really hate when records which are items of pleasure with music are treated as a commodity.
Yes I know that is the world we live in and always has been but does not mean I have to like it.

Quite happy most of the time with my bargain $1 bin dive finds!

“l can damn sure bet you that a digital download at 16/44 using an allpass filter to remove the dynamic compression for the loudness wars and then re-encoded with the 33 hertz frequency will blow the mofi vinyl away.” 

Then why don’t you, why make such a fuss about the escalated price of a sold out ‘limited edition’ item. It’s a hobby, if you can’t justify paying $125 for a collector’s item, stick with digital downloads or streaming.