In The Beginning

In the beginning, there was the record album; CBS looked upon it and said, “This is good.” RCA looked upon it and said, “We shall invent the 45 so children can have just the song they want.”

Later came the cassette; in days to come, CBS/Sony said, “This costs us fifty cents to make and we charge the customer $9.98. This is good.”

Came the Compact Disc, which left the factory at a remarkably low cost but somehow ended up taking $17.98 from the consumers’ pockets. Manufacturer, wholesaler and dealer alike laughed.

Later, the DVD. I shall not betray any trade secrets, but let me say at $10 retail, everyone in the line would be making money. At $29.95, you can’t hear yourself think for the cash registers singing away, the people involved slapping each other on the backs.

To the question, “Do you know how much it costs us to make these??” you simply reply, “No. How much does it cost you?

Remember the hula hoops? Sure, some people came in late and went broke, but those who saw the potential early and didn’t overproduce took a few cents worth of plastic and did quite well. Pet rocks … cost of packaging and finding rocks; can’t beat that. DVDs? About $2 each out of the factory.