Target tackles the dying CD market with Collective Soul

In an inventive move for the CD market industry, Atlanta-based rock band Collective Soul have signed an exclusive deal with Target Corporation (NYSE: TGT) to market and sell their seventh studio album Afterwords, due out on August 28. Target stores will be the only retailers selling physical copies of the album, while Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) handles the digital version in the iTunes Store.

The band's last studio album, 2004's Youth only managed to peak at #66 in the Billboard 200, but sparked another hit single for the band with "Counting the Days." If memory serves me correctly, I purchased that album from a Target for my sister, and frontman Ed Roland told Billboard that accessibility fueled the decision to market the album with one major retail outlet (excluding marketing achieved online for the digital version). His sentiment about Target stores being highly accessible is one I agree with, but the move to sale an album via only one retail chain seems to limit its success. That problem is only heightened by the continual slow decline of the CD market.

An easy move to accessibility seems obvious though, if you don't want to go to Target, you retain the option to buy the online version. At the same time, a limited source to purchase the physical copies lowers the cost of producing actual CDs. It seems highly doubtful that Target would stock any more than Target normally stocks for any album. The push to purchase an album online stems from this, or at least that is the feeling I get when reading that I "have" to go to one particular store to buy it. In the end, it will all be about accessibility so any limitations that come from selling an album at only one store are obscured when the album is still available to purchase online.