Rough Trade in the 1970's

How did Rough Trade start?
-Geoff Travis started Rough Trade by opening up one shop that sold records in west London 30 years ago.
Which music trends were popular?
-In the summer of 1976 punk become very popular.
What was the ethos of Rough Trade?
-By now punks were revolting against all mainstream music, and they wanted to support this by selling a different genre of music to mainstream.
How was rough trades different to large corporations?
-Rough trade didnt follow the genre of music that was being released by mainstream companies for example Rough trade released punk music and soon after that they released reggie music.
What techniques were used to expand the Independent music scene?
- Rough Trade created an alliance between punk and reggae music, which was seen as a "unique/alternative spirit".
How did this lead to Rough Trade's expansion?
- This created a new type of music and showed independent artists that you don't have to be part of mainstream music culture, to become popular. it also led to artist sending in their music for Rough trade to sell.
What type of business structure existed in the 1970's?
- Their business structure was 'do it yourself' they didnt want to build an empire they just wanted to release music to the public that mainstream werent releasing.
Explain the successes of the distribution department and record label..
- In the 70's record distribution was controlled mainly by big companies, so Rough Trade started mail orders to other companies to sell independent records, giving independent artists a chance to get the music across. Where the profit was cut exactly by half more artists began to contact Rough Trade, this is when Independent labels started to affect the big companies as the artists began to abandon mainstream labels. In 1978 Daniel Miller set up 'Mute Records' and used Rough Trade as a distribution service, allowing Rough Trade to start using new records to sell.