Quote Originally Posted by Martin Dust
Oil is going knowhere for a long time and won't really be a factor in what happens to vinyl, it has never impacted on the price and I don't see a reason why it should start now.
http://www.peak-oil.org/

If you don't believe we're already experiencing the effects of peak oil then you're in la la land. For right now we're okay on vinyl production prices, but the consumer prices are skyrocketing. Not only is vinyl partially made with oil, but the machines that press vinyl rely on it. It's getting costly to operate those machines. Once it's pressed up...the trucks, planes, trains, and boats rely on oil/gas/petrol to get the records from the plants to the shops and finally into our hands. If this scene makes it long enough to the time period where we start having serious global issues...well, I have a feeling importing techno vinyl will be relatively low on the list of priorities for shipping ports.

Let's look at it from your angle now. Say myself and the rest of the scientists are wrong and peak oil is bullshit. Oil is still on the rise everyday and its driving shipping costs up big time. Here in the United States, an imported record costs an average of $12US...probably around £5 if my math is right. Now tack on the U.S. sales tax per state, which is probably an average of 6 cents. Rounding off, you're looking at $12.50 for one record, which we all know there is usually about one decent track on it. It sucks when you drop $25 at the record shop and come home with two tracks. For this reason alone, many people I know have either quit DJing or stopped buying vinyl. The mark up at an average U.S. record shop is only $3 so the only people who are really making any money is the shipping companies, who in return also give a good part of their money to big oil. Economics baby.