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How well did VI devs do in sales this year?

Gingerbread

Gingerbread

Senior Member
I’m curious how VI devs fared this year, relative to past years. Would any devs here be willing to share whether this year’s sales were up, down, or flat compared to last year, just in very general terms?

Or any other significant change in consumer trends that you saw this year for VIs? Any sign that the industry is changing in any particular way? Any pleasant surprises?
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Better than last year, which was terrible, but still not as good as 2021 which my best year yet. 2023 was pretty tough most of the year, but things picked up a lot in the last few months. Hope that trend continues into 2024, but I think without a steady stream of new releases 2024 will be tough until the end of the year.

People I know in other industries with better knowledge of global finances than I, tell me they expect things to be largely back to normal by the end of 2024. I mention that because I believe the current trouble all devs are experiencing has more to do with global economics than problems specific to this industry.

Yes, there's market saturation, and many people on this forum have already bought what they need, but new people discover VI's and making music every day, so I think the market is actually expanding, not shrinking, there's just many more developers now than a few years ago, and people have less money to spend on their hobby, so making the sale is harder, but I'm not worried. I just have to get through the first half of 2024, then I believe things will pick up.
 
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I kind of doubt any of the major developers will come forward to answer that question with any hard data. On one hand, potential customers might feel more secure buying the product that everyone else is buying, but on the other hand, customers might not want to be using the exact same sounds that everyone else is using.
 
We grew every year in revenue starting in 2008, all the way through 2021, which was our best year ever (2020 was of course, second place.) 2020/21 being big spikes were an industry-wide trend in not just music software but music retail in general. Then 2022 we saw our first-ever pullback. For most of the year we were down ~25-30% YoY which matched what a lot of others went through, but we were able to claw that back to just -10%.

As we close out 2023 we're looking at a modest improvement over 2022, which is a small victory. I would say the trend was still pushing downward though. We've done a huge amount to improve our site & systems and also increased our marketing spend to combat that downward push. That said, I definitely have VERY high expectations for 2024, especially given how many "fire" releases we have coming up (as the kids say.)
 
2020 and 2021 were our best years so far - 2022 wasn't bad, but we did a project for someone else, so revenue was propped up by that. The problem was, we torpedoed our release schedule to do it, so we're just now getting back on track. 4th quarter is where we make almost 1/2 of our revenue, usually... but unless there is some sort of oddball miracle in the next 6 days, I think we'll be lucky to make 1/2 what we usually do in the last quarter.

I'm fortunate in that sample sales are my side gig so while it supplements my income and enables me to support my GAS (and scores, recordings.....) it's not the end of the world if it fluctuates.

I'd say the market for Hauptwerk sample sets is pretty saturated, too - people seem to want instruments that are huge and significant/famous.... and those take a lot of time to produce (not to mention get permission to sample!)

We are back on our preferred release schedule as of the first of 2024, but i only have one (large) project in the can waiting for processing.
 
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Maybe 2022 was the year the Smart Delay series really hit the market? Speaking for myself, that’s when I started buying basically every Straightahead library that came out, because the instruments really bring something new to the table.
 
doctoremmet said:
Maybe 2022 was the year the Smart Delay series really hit the market? Speaking for myself, that’s when I started buying basically every Straightahead library that came out, because the instruments really bring something new to the table.
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I was thinking the same. I also wonder if Acoustic Samples have done better since their new libraries came out.

I know it is off-topic but i really do feel like users still have a real appitite for innovation in the sampling world and the popularity of both SAS and AS shows that.
 
StraightAheadSamples said:
2022 was our best year ever by a mile.
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That’s pretty incredible, my 2022 was down by more than 50% compared to 2021. 2023 revenue is “only” down about 30% compared to 2021, so better than the disaster of last year.

It was reflected in website traffic too, I changed nothing in my approach to marketing and communication, people just stopped coming to the website. This year is roughly the same as last year in terms of traffic, but sales are way better this year, mostly due to the release of Intimate Viola And a much better Black Friday.

The below image is website visits per year, growing the first 3 years, then boom. As a busines owner this is obviously not a graph you want to see, it’s utterly panick inducing, especially when you haven’t changed a thing and there’s no clear explanation, nor solution.

IMG_8548.jpeg
 
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Markrs said:
I also wonder if Acoustic Samples have done better since their new libraries came out.
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Well, I am inclined to say yes. For pretty much the same reasons, they have been able to show a bit of a “breakthrough” and for the first time I feel Falcon has become the host of a truly serious series of “orchestral” instruments. This must have resulted in quite a few extra sales?
 
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