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On Sunday morning the chatter shifted to Best Buy, who decided at the last minute to keep their entire buying staff at the home office in front of a massive change in the company’s operating structure.

SPRING IN THE AIR FOR
NARM ATTENDEES

Talk of Best Buy’s Last-Minute Decision Not to Attend Dominates Convention’s Early Going
It’s a hoot and a holler. It’s a kick in the kiester. It’s a bunch of guys in Bermuda shorts named Murray.

It’s the last spring edition of the NARM convention before they move it to August in 2004. And even though attendance is reportedly down to some 1,600 from last year’s 2,900 mark, most attendees were very upbeat. Most seem to be of a mind that they had "made the cut."

NARM officially starts today here in Orlando, but got an early start on Saturday night as a showcase by Universal’s Soundtrack Of Our Lives became the buzz of the convention.

Playing at downtown Orlando club The Social, the set blew away a massive group of jaded attendees who actually took a bus ride (unheard of at NARM functions) to see the band.

On Sunday morning the chatter shifted to Best Buy, who decided at the last minute to keep their entire buying staff at the home office in front of a massive change in the company’s operating structure. BB’s new IOM (integrated operating model) will, according to BB Entertainment Software honcho Gary Arnold, break down the walls separating purchasing, inventory, store ops and advertising departments.

It will also streamline the company, and with possible layoffs occurring over the next few days, Best Buy brass thought it wise to have everyone back on campus for the news.

Arnold stresses that it’s affecting all product lines, not just the music division. He also insists that it has no relation to rumors of more Sam Goody closures on the horizon, as the two entities get ready to combine offices in mid-May.

There is also a lot of chatter about Best Buy’s new proposals on exchanging up front co-op costs with percentages based on sales. This includes a fixed percentage (as yet undetermined) on new releases and a 50 cent per unit charge on all developing artists titles.

Best Buy is also apparently asking for a whopping 25% on all catalog titles based on sales, with the understanding that any title over one year old will be considered catalog. That would mean that Norah Jones, for example, would be thrown into the category of catalog.

Currently the rule of thumb has been that a title has to be out for a year and a half and fallen out of the Top 200 before it’s relegated to catalog. Not many here believe that BB will be granted all of its wishes, but being far and away the largest catalog buyer in the nation (only Tower’s 95 stores and Virgin’s 25 stores carry a deeper selection) it’s definitely caught everyone’s attention.

Club NARM’s first night was hosted by the new WEA team, bringing back memories of the PGD Zone that Jim Caparro and company created so many years ago. Performances by Robert Randolph, Simple Plan, Jason Mraz, Lucy Woodward, Plumb and Weekend Players rocked the house.

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