A fiver is cheap considering that the retailer will take 50% of that! However, we now only have one national music chain left which is HMV, so if they don't order your releases then you're in trouble. So now we have to design releases which will work for HMV, especially in the middle of a recession, so that means coming up with something that they can get behind and which will work for their huge sales campaigns which are about 4 times a year. In order to clear that price you have to go to all the repertoire owners and beg for a lower royalty rate, screw down costs ruthlessly and get your maths right. And then pray that the releases will sell through LOL. It's a horribly difficult market as Ady, Tony and anyone else who is in the music biz will agree.
And you're quite right about Richard not allowing his personal tastes to interfere with his job. The supermarkets basically sell music the same way they sell beans - the same principles apply and it's all about revenue and shelf space. I'm pretty sure that Morrison's haven't stocked ANY of Richard's own compilations because the average Morrisons customer probably isn't too bothered about George Soule or Rance Allen and Richard knows that.
Having said that, I think supermarkets could improve their ranges beyond the Top 40 and Pop compilations and offer a wider selection in their music sections. Ever since Woolworths and Zavvi crashed it's become much harder for the public to buy CD's spontaneously and I think the supermarkets could pick up more sales if they had a wider selection on offer.
It shows how much music has been devalued when you can buy a double Teddy Pendergrass CD for £4.00 and some killer compilations with over 75 minutes of music for less than a packet of fags!
And it's worth keep all your CD's and Vinyl 'cos when the Chinese unleash their cyber-bomb and disable all computers in the West, then you'll still have the physical copies left to play!
Ian D