It was only launched on Friday last week, but Rough Trade has already suspended its new vinyl selling service.
The scheme, a partnership with Flip Vinyl, reputedly the "fastest growing second hand vinyl buyers in Germany", essentially replicated the service offered by second-hand record shops up and down the country. But even on the first day it appeared that Rough Trade had got this badly wrong, as social media reported stories of derisory amounts being offered for genuinely valuable records.
One punter wrote on Twitter/X: “Absolutely disgraceful prices and you should be ashamed to have partnered with them. Just put my 10 most valuable records in there worth over 4k (median) and it’s not even offering me £100 for the lot. Grim profiteering.”
Another reported: “Someone offered me £9 for the David Bowie ‘Five Years’ vinyl box set which is worth £1000!!? Surely Rough Trade will bin this ill-advised scheme...” Whilst another wrote: “Who dreamt up this scheme? You’re offering next to nowt, with no transparency about how the records are being sold on. Putting the word Flip in the title shows exactly what you’re at. I don’t think I’ll be buying from Rough Trade any more.”
The swift backlash led Rough Trade to issue a statement, attempting to justify the prices: “Please note! We appreciate this service won’t be suitable for everyone’s needs i.e. those seeking to maximise collectible items. However for anyone looking to trade casually for a quick turn-around i.e. to make space, then this could well be a great solution.”
A statement on the launch of FlipVinyl for the UK market. pic.twitter.com/iifjSNdLrZAugust 3, 2024
However, this didn’t stem the criticism and by end of play Saturday Rough Trade Managing Director Lawrence Montgomery had put out a statement suspending the scheme, saying, “It’s clear based on feedback from a number of customers that we made wrong assumptions and that people viewed this service as inappropriate and saw us as profiteering.”
“This was not our intention, however we understand and appreciate these criticisms and take full responsibility. As a result, we are going to suspend the service to give us time to reassess. We’re very sorry for this mistake.”
The Flip debacle is a rare mis-step for Rough Trade, which has been at the forefront of the vinyl revival for well over a decade now. From just one West London store, the group has expanded to encompass an East End store and branches in Nottingham, Bristol and New York. In January it was announced that it was opening a fifth UK store in Liverpool ‘later this year’.
