October 18, 2023 • 52 mins
In this episode we are sitting down with Pierre van Dongen from Green Vinyl, a conversation we’ve wanted to have and share with our listeners for quite some time. Green Vinyl is working to innovate the vinyl manufacturing process by developing an environmentally friendly and alternative production process for vinyl records, replacing traditional plastics for eco-friendly materials. Learn more about their innovation in record pressing, where things stand now, and ways in which we can help advance a more eco-friendly product that we all will still enjoy in the same way for years to come.
Check out:
Green Vinyl: https://greenvinylrecords.com
Watch the Process: https://youtu.be/puLjP0D-zJ0?feature=shared
Big thank you to Canadian Artist Kue Varo for the use of her song ‘Winter Lining’ off her upcoming album Cowboy Witchcraft being released by Robyn’s new Red Spade Records label. Find more on the label launch, Kue's album and where to purchase the physical release at: www.kuevaro.bandcamp.com/ and www.redspadereccords.com
THANK YOU TO OUR SUPPORTERS! The ones that make your vinyl needs even more accessible with so many great codes and resources.
Other Record Labels - Who’ve gifted our listeners - you! - a 25% code in their store for the myriad of resources compiled there using the code WIVFRIENDS at checkout! https://www.otherrecordlabels.com/store
As always, join the conversation on Instagram or send us a note at: media@womeninvinyl.com
Check out www.womeninvinyl.com for past episodes, the store, job board, and the growing library of resources!
Don’t forget to like, subscribe and give us a review on your favorite podcast delivery method!
You can also contribute to furthering our mission at https://www.patreon.com/womeninvinyl where you’ll find all of the B-Sides, Deep Cuts and amazing extras, including longer episodes and contribute to the creation of scholarships and educational opportunities to further the demystification and infiltration of more Women and Non-Binary identifying humans into the Vinyl Making Space!
Check out:
Green Vinyl: https://greenvinylrecords.com
Watch the Process: https://youtu.be/puLjP0D-zJ0?feature=shared
Big thank you to Canadian Artist Kue Varo for the use of her song ‘Winter Lining’ off her upcoming album Cowboy Witchcraft being released by Robyn’s new Red Spade Records label. Find more on the label launch, Kue's album and where to purchase the physical release at: www.kuevaro.bandcamp.com/ and www.redspadereccords.com
THANK YOU TO OUR SUPPORTERS! The ones that make your vinyl needs even more accessible with so many great codes and resources.
Other Record Labels - Who’ve gifted our listeners - you! - a 25% code in their store for the myriad of resources compiled there using the code WIVFRIENDS at checkout! https://www.otherrecordlabels.com/store
- Selektor Record Bags - Our new favorite record bag: https://www.theselektor.com/us/
- Koeppel Design (pronounced Kep-ul) - Sleek and sophisticated, handmade record collection organization! Get $10 off your first order of $75 using the code WOMENINVINYL at checkout! https://koeppeldesign.com/
- Eargasm - High fidelity ear plugs! keep your hearing protected in style! Eargasm has a great deal for you with 10% off your order using, you guessed it, discount code: WOMENINVINYL at checkout. www.eargasm.com/
- Glowtronics - Custom slip mats - you already love the WIV branded slipmat, but think, you can make your own! Get 15% off using the code: WOMENINVINYL15 at www.glowtronics-store.com/
- Nugen Audio - Innovative, intuitive, award-winning professional audio plugins and software for all your creative music producing and sound design needs! Use code WOMENINVINYL for 20% off at check out: https://nugenaudio.com/womeninvinyl/
- Vinyl Revolution Record Show - Attend one of the longest running record shows out there. 55 dealer tables filled with vendors from all over the east coast and tons of rare and collectible vinyl records! Find more at: https://www.instagram.com/vinylrevolutionrecordshow/
As always, join the conversation on Instagram or send us a note at: media@womeninvinyl.com
Check out www.womeninvinyl.com for past episodes, the store, job board, and the growing library of resources!
Don’t forget to like, subscribe and give us a review on your favorite podcast delivery method!
You can also contribute to furthering our mission at https://www.patreon.com/womeninvinyl where you’ll find all of the B-Sides, Deep Cuts and amazing extras, including longer episodes and contribute to the creation of scholarships and educational opportunities to further the demystification and infiltration of more Women and Non-Binary identifying humans into the Vinyl Making Space!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:03):
Welcome to the Women in Vinyl Podcastwith Jen Dugenia, founder of Women in
Vinyl, and contributor Robin Raymond.This podcast facilitates conversations with those working in
the vinyl record industry to educate,demystify, and diversify the vinyl community.
(00:37):
You can call me doragmatic, sensa bullet, pragmatic and intellect ghost contacting,
pseudo spiritual. You could sound dramatic. I have been known to hathematic
attacks. I'm so self critical Ahint navety, I got the maner who
(01:04):
is with? I'm sentimental, abrasional. I have my grandfather Spain sing b
It's be easy onesome. Thank youfor joining us on episode forty five of
the Women in Vinyl Podcast. Youjust heard winter lining by Canadian artist q
(01:30):
Varrow of her upcoming album Cowboy Witchcraft, being released on Robin's new Red Spade
Records label. Find more on thelabel, launch, ques album, and
where to purchase the physical release viawww. Dot Qvarrow dot bandcamp dot com
and also at Redspaderecords dot com.In this episode, we are sitting down
(01:51):
with Pierre Vandongjen from Green Vinyl,a conversation we've wanted to have and share
with you all for a long time. Green Vinyl is working to innovate the
vinyl manufacturing process by developing an environmentallyfriendly and alternative production process for vinyl records.
It's replacing traditional plastics for eco friendlymaterials. Learn more about their innovation
(02:15):
and record pressing, where things standnow, and ways in which we can
help advance a more eco friendly productthat we will all still enjoy in the
same way for years to come.Thank you so much for joining us.
We have been excited to have thisconversation for a while, so I'm glad
we were able to make it happen. And we'll sort of just dive right
(02:35):
in. So tell us a littlebit about you. How you found your
way into the industry. Yeah,so I've originally out of the CD DVD
industry. Started in the Netherlands ata company called odme Will made equipment to
(02:55):
produce CDs and DVDs. They broughtme to the US and through you know,
quite a few years in that industry. We started. Me and three
of my friends, all Dutch guys, started for ourselves in the CD and
DVD industry. So we mostly didsecond hand equipment for CDs and DVDs became
(03:20):
very quickly one of the larger resellerof that used equipment. We were also
the only ones who would install itapp factories with no risk and trained people
train the whole facility. So twentysixteen we got a lot of requests suddenly
for secondhand vinyl equipment, you know, and of course very very little available.
(03:46):
And what was there was, youknow, really old. I mean
most of it got scrapped in thelate eighties. So we've you know,
we got that question once twice,three times, and then we started thinking
like, wow, what's what's goingon? So we dove a little bit
more into it. And one ofmy my business partner's harm Tennis, is
(04:08):
a very very experienced molding engineer,and it was like this is this is
weird. We should look at thatin a different way. So he found
a big arm how do you callhim old old Phillips video disc mold,
put that in a molding machine,did a one sided stamper from a vinyl
(04:32):
stamper against it, injected some Ithink the first one was PVC or so
or no not PC polygonnate into itand it worked. You could play it
and that kind of was the startof it. So we started developing a
new method of making make up vinylrecords in a in an injection molding way
(04:56):
that that was already done in thelate eighties. I think in Japan did
a lot of research to that,but I got put in the in the
fridge because you know, the theCD came up and vinyl was on a
downturn, so they really did notcontinue that that research. So we that's
kind of how we we got intothe final world. We started off with
(05:21):
that. We after a lot ofrequests, we received a grant from the
European Union from the Dutch government todo some more research on it together with
quite a few different companies and uhthat that went actually pretty well. So
now we have a a molded recordout of pet and which is recyclable.
(05:54):
It's less damaging. Also on thestampers, if you can imagine, you
know, the traditionally you kind ofrolled the bucket PVCT from the inside to
the outside and you're pushing against theinside of the of the groups. With
molding, you inject very very hotplastic and believe it something like three hundred
(06:14):
degreesius into a mold that closes coolsoff real quickly and that slicisfies the record,
so the sample lifetime is a lotlonger. Also, I think we're
up to over ten thousand shots ona set of stampers right now. But
the goal was to make it makerecords either at equal or maybe if possible
(06:39):
better sound quality than the traditional ones, same feel, you know, almost
no difference to the end user.That was the goal, but at a
lot of lower costs and lower energyuses your usage. So we had it
actually a month ago. We hadit qualified by an independent laboratory and with
(07:01):
the dryers, the printer, thewhole molding system, everything connected, we
use less than zero point two kilowatthour per record. Wow. Compare that
to for one hundred and eighty gramsrecord traditionally you're probably at a two point
eight to two point nine killow Sohuge savings. You know, everybody wants
(07:27):
to get get better for the environmentand and do their do their best,
so that was a huge step.Next to that, we also thought,
well all the labels, uh,you know that that's a lot of paper
also not great for the environment.So we have a developed a direct to
(07:49):
record printer, so we print directlyon the record. Uh, you know,
A, we don't use any paperanymore, use very little ink to
UV cure blink. Also completely recyclablein the system, and you can do
that on demand. So if youdo five hundred records, you need just
(08:11):
five hundred prints and not you know, like with the labels now you probably
have to order five and thirty orfive and forty labels from both sides.
So that that was you know,it's a big a big savings and also
a better for the environment. Sowhat does it actually look like? Because
I think a lot of listeners areused to or understand the process of you
(08:33):
know, we're putting stampers in themachine, we're pressing the park. You
know, the labels are in themachine. Is this Does this look similar
to that process and how these aremade? Yes and no. So the
stampers are are exactly well almost thesame. They're surrounded right. No.
(08:54):
No, the stampers are made thesame as for traditional vinyl. So it's
we do that here in Pineville inour office here. The only difference is
that we don't have to form themtypically form them the outside and coin them
on the inside. For either aPhoenix Alfa or two legs or a you
(09:16):
know, viral mold. Ours arecompletely flat because they are put into a
mold, they have to be Theirflatness has to be very yeah, equal
on all sides, on the inside, outside, and on the four quadrants.
So we go with a two hundredand fifty nimeter thickness. Whereas traditionally
(09:39):
everybody just weighs the stamper. Itdoesn't matter if they're thicken on the inside
outside. That creates, you know, sometimes a little process problems to get
everything correct. But the stampers aresaying nickel. So the what happens is
the cristal, the molding machine willmount stampers, the molding machine will close
its more. We inject a hotplastic pet into that with a cooling channel.
(10:07):
We cool that off real fast.The molt opens, a robot takes
them out, then it gets cooledfor a couple of steps, and that
same robot takes a record which isalready cooled, and puts it into the
printer. I can actually send you, guys a video that makes maybe a
little bit more sense, or it'savailable on LinkedIn. Our LinkedIn patients pretty
(10:28):
much all the videos, so it'sall completely automated, you really don't need
any people anymore to handle anything,so we don't have to trim anything off
of it. The only little wasteor stuff we can recycle is a small
sprew on the inside which is noteven a grammar so and we can regrind
(10:54):
it put it back into the system, so kind of like a pin slash.
Yeah, yeah, it's it's theThe process is very, very similar
to make a CD. It's justbigger, cool, interesting. And so
what is that cycle time? Likecycle time is just below twenty seconds?
I think you had nineteen point eight. Typically we just run flat twenty seconds
(11:20):
and so three every minute. Yeah, I mean a little scary that it
would eliminate so many heer, we'retrying to find jobs for people. Luckily
there's a lot of you know,to be honest, the more important jobs
(11:43):
for quality control, people who listento the records, packaging. Still you
know, mainly it's you can automateit a little bit, but you know,
to do that right, you stillhave to have a lot of people.
Yeah, but yeah, it isyou know, kind of on one
(12:05):
side. Yeah, you need lesspeople pretty much. We say one operator
for two machines two maybe three ifyou run a really big, big order
but safely said as one operator fortwo, Well, and how much like
what's this? What's the footprint ofeach of each machine? So like we've
all seen kind of the inside ofa pressing plant and what that looks like.
(12:26):
Is it similar smaller? It's definitelyquite a bit bigger. Yeah,
you probably could fit at least twotraditional practice presses on the spot, which
you know, if you roughly said, you know, a traditional press can
(12:46):
do around five hundred thousand records ayear. Ours can do a million plus.
So all in all that that comparesto each other. What about the
amount that you can fit because theprocess is are you able to fit more
on the stampers or is it stillthe same amount of music? It's exactly
the same the final record. Ifyou really look at the record, they're
(13:11):
a little bit sturdier because the ptdoesn't flexor actually doesn't change form after you
cool it. There's also a benefit, you know, if you I've had
one laying in my front window inmy car for the summer, just to
check it out and see if itworked, and it just stays the same.
(13:31):
But the only real difference is ithas a square edge on the outer
edge, so it's not tapered,it's it's square the only if you really
look at it, that's what peoplesay. Hey, wait a minute,
that's the different I see. Yeah, Well, and I cut PET,
so I'm familiar with it as well. And you guys actually gave me some
(13:52):
to test cut, so it's inthere. It's in the cue of things
to do. But it's getting downthere into the lathe cut community too,
which is kind of cool because Imean, having having petg has been has
been pretty awesome because it is recyclable, so I worry less about my my
(14:13):
footprint because of my errors in cuttingand stuff too. So yeah, and
those are a little bit different PETthan what we use for molding, just
because of you know, the heatingof the needle or your your stylers.
And then how would cuts, howhow would flake? So how do you
(14:33):
call that curls? We've we've donequite a few research on that too,
and I think we have something whichhas a fairly decent noise floor. I
mean at least not like like theones you get get kind of cut out
of the big sheets of flat PET. They're still wavy, there's still been
(14:56):
rolled so but we do make doesthe same actually as the record regular records,
just only with at Stamfords, butnothing on there. Yeah, it's
great. And to put it sortof plainly for people like is this recyclable
in a way where they could likeput it in in there? Yeah,
(15:16):
like a record sucks, I'm goingto put it in the recycle ben.
Or is it like after some timeit's going to it's not going to last
like a normal record will for thousandsof years. Actually it will. So
we've done some reason. We getan audio engineer, grab a record and
play that song over and over andover again and recorder it every I think
(15:41):
twenty or thirty plays, and thereis he could only see a sound degradation
after foreigner times playing Wow, comparedto a regular record, you're looking at
probably sixty seventy times. And itis because the material in principle is harder.
Uh, pet's a little bit moredurable. So and I always say,
(16:06):
like, you know who's going torecycle their records? I mean I
see a whole bunch behind you.You will never if you do anything,
you give it to somebody else,or you sell them, or you're never
going to throw those away. It'smore in the I think, in the
production process where where the recycling comesinto play, and in the overproduction you
(16:26):
know, where where for example,we've made so many Adele records and they
didn't they didn't sell all and it'sof course easier to recycle and put it
into a different pt product you know, you know, you know, a
storage container, a bottle, anythinglike that. But it is possible to
(16:48):
especially black, to just regrind thatstick it back in well. And I
think that would be the next questionfor everybody, because the question that I
got from when I was telling peoplethat we were going to enter it was
like, oh, but what ifI don't like green? And I was
like, no, it's not thatall of the records are green, they're
(17:08):
recycled or being they're able to upcycle. So is there still the myriad of
colors and does it have to bea solid color? Are there effects that
are possible with injections? So ourbeginning material is completely blank, so it's
it's see through. You can alsodo uh you know, make those and
(17:32):
you can there actually you can seestraight through it. It's like a glass
glass, blank paint. What wedo before the plastic pellets go into the
barrel, they get a little bitof dye and that dye makes the color
so either black, red, green, and they can do opaque or translucent.
So you know, here's a translucentred my favorite. There. Oh
(17:57):
nice anything, and I actually likethe purple. Purple looks also, yeah,
that's pretty. And so there's there'sa tiny little bit of dye into
this which follows the palace of PTand then it melts and you get one
(18:17):
color. That's super simple. Actually, we also don't have to have,
you know, twenty thirty different colorson stock. We just have one big
bag of PT and a couple ofcans of dye and that's that's how I
do it. So what do youthink that it will take at this point
for the industry and consumer to fullyembrace this process? Artists, I think,
(18:41):
uh, we see that this.Of course, there is a big
pushback from the traditional vinyl manufacturing plants, and understandably so it's also not a
replacement of that, it's an addition. We we feel that the artist has
(19:03):
to push this, and we're talkingto several large artists who say, yes,
we need to do something for ourenvironment. And it is more important
than just money, you know,and there's especially in Highland also. We
had a lot of discussions and alot of presentations about you know, how
can we be more sustainable, howcan we get greener you know, less
(19:26):
energy, and there's a lot ofideas and plans, but the biggest issue
is as soon as that release datecomes closer, it goes out the door,
you know. Then then yeah,we're not going to look for a
you know, a transport which ischeap or which is better for the environment.
Now it needs to get there,so we're gonna fly it. That's
(19:49):
the whole idea has to be pushedby the by the artist, and when
the artist wants that, then itwill happen. And the good part is
that this this method is also verycompetitive in price. Yeah, that would
be my next question. Yeah.Yeah, I'm working in a record store
(20:12):
three times a week. That's Imean, I hear it all the time,
and as part of the sales teamwhere I'm buying new records and we're
watching the prices from the majors increasetime after time, and you're looking at
what you had this record for youknow, three months ago, and you're
reordering it and now it's you know, fifteen or twenty percent more. How
(20:33):
does that Where does that part ofthe conversation come in? Where are you
approaching? Are you talking to thelabels or to the artists directly and saying
like, here's the problem, youcan do it both both. The labels
are of course very interested, butI think the artists we're talking, we're
(20:56):
currently talking to, they will decide. I mean, you also to see
that more artists want to be incontrol of their own music and their own
production, their own media out there. You see that Metallica, you know,
joining with Furnace, I mean Metallica, say, is one of the
first ones who really start doing that. And we hope that that with us,
(21:22):
that that will happen the same withone or two big artists. And
we're just hoping that Taylor Swift getsa piece of green vinyl in her robust
and then it's all good. Right, that will pretty much do it for
everybody. Yeah, I mean,somebody from that caliber that will definitely help.
Okay, well, how do wedo that? We were working on
(21:44):
that, that's for sure. Imean, we we work together with a
group and there's some let's said,very very well known artists involved, and
hopefully next year we'll we will havea system here in the US or multiple
(22:07):
You all know by now that Robinand I are on opposite ends of the
record organizational spectrum. But one thingwe do agree on is how fantastic Keuple
designs. Record dividers and record blocksare beautifully handcrafted by expert craftswomen in San
Francisco. Kepel dividers are sleek,sophisticated, customizable and built to last no
(22:29):
matter how you organize. Kepple arethe dividers to use. Get ten dollars
off your first order of eighty fivedollars or more using code women in Vinyl
at checkout www dot kepeldesign dot com. That's k O E P p e
l design dot com. And nowback to the episode. So if a
(22:56):
pressing plant wanted to invest in havingsomething like this, is it something that
they could reach out to you andand try to set up getting a machine
or a system or is it atthis stage you're developing it for the artist
level. So at this moment wewe decided that let's let's first do it
ourselves. We have one basilion theNetherlands where where we have the Betelan machine.
(23:23):
The next one will be here inCharlotte. That's Q one next year
if everything goes well, and thenwe'll build on that. So we can
first let's let's get this bigger andmore more acceptable by the by the general
public and the artists and and thestudios, and then we'll we'll take the
(23:45):
next step. But for now,we decided that we we wanted to keep
it in house. We've you know, my my business partners all have to
be have been service engineers and technicians. And they said, well, really,
I don't want to travel that muchanymore. Yeah, they don't,
(24:06):
you know, they're getting a littlebit older, have kids, and they
said, well, we prefer tobe at home instead of on the road,
because these guys were definitely road warriorsin their younger days. Yeah.
Well, I mean a great placeto have it is the Netherlands because there's
some really robust labels there and inEurope specifically. So I'm sure that because
(24:27):
the governments are still much more progressiveover there, that there's probably some incentives
government wise to subsidize some things forartists to be able to do that.
Yeah. Yeah, I don't haveheard. I haven't heard from any subsidies
for artists. But you know,one of the big things in Europe,
(24:48):
they were way further there than herein the US. The CO two tax.
You know, that's a big,big chunk, and that's only going
to be bigger. The Netherlands isone of the the main pushes for that.
Typically Denolence UH wants to be thebest kid in the class, so
(25:10):
they're they're very progressive in getting everybodyof the natural gas, you know,
all sustainable energy heat exchanges into houses, et cetera. So they pushed that
a lot. And once you know, if you look at the savings just
on the CO two and the energy, if you know, ninety three percent
less CO two, it's also ninetythree percent less CO two text you have
(25:36):
to pay. So there's that mightbe a big incentive for finally the the
the whole vinyl community to switch.And you're saying it it's a potential as
like a bolt on into an existingplant, right, like do you you
would you use the same infrastructure forchillers and things like that, so so
(25:56):
you don't need the the boilers anymore, So don't use any natural gas.
What we need is is a moldingmachine in the printer. You have a
PT drying system because PT typically wantsto collect moisture instead of get rid of
it. So you have that.You have a air compressor, you have
(26:18):
a chilled water system, close loop, and that's it. There's no natural
gas, no steam boilers, noexpensive piping, et cetera. It's just
electricity. Yeah, that's awesome,it's great. Aside from I'm sure what
would be tons of hype stickers ifsomeone did move forward with this, What
(26:41):
would the consumer know the difference?Like if they put it on their turntable,
what would be the difference if anyNothing. So there's no like calibration
or anything. No, nothing.You know, probably ninety percent of the
people won't even see it or hearit or feel any different until you start
really looking at it, like,Okay, it's got a square edge and
(27:06):
feels maybe a little bit different,but the weight is the same. We
can't do anything else about more eightyI That's that's what it is. What
about are you going to do sevenswe haven't made. Actually should be way
(27:26):
easier to do than the twelve inchbecause the the you know, the the
hardest part is getting all that liquidplastic to the outside of the of the
mold. Seven inches would be Imean, it's just a little bit bigger
than the CD not that hard,so that it is a step we will
definitely do. We will just haveto make a different mold for that most
(27:51):
size. Yeah, but yes,you I mean if you feel me and
you bend them a little bit,you could probably feel like, yeah,
this is a little bit different materialbecause it will straight back in the original
forums. Then yeah, the centerlabel thing is super interesting too. Yeah.
Well, I mean it's similar tothe record that a neck and Record
(28:15):
Industry did that looked like a stainedglass record. So it's it's that's the
same kind of printer. It's juston a you just have a smaller area
that they're printing. Is that correct? You're yes, I do have one.
So you have one, well notat off first, but I was
(28:36):
like, dude, they only madetwo hundred of those just printed straight on
there. Oh wow, And soyou're what, it's a digital printer.
So with I think there's twenty fourthirty six different heads on there, and
(28:57):
the record goes underneath it, itprints, it cures it with UV light,
then the robot flips it does theother side, we've we've tested it
out. Harm has actually got outthe center label, stuck it in for
a month and his diswasher it wentthrough every cycle and it was still there.
(29:18):
There was no difference, So therewas I thought, a pretty good
durability test. And for people sincepeople are listening and can't see, I
mean, it looks like a fullcolor center label, same size everything.
It's really cool and the like,if you have a very busy label,
that's easier because you you know,if you think about the printing head,
it has all these kind of littlechannels in there. If you miss one
(29:41):
little dot, you see a smallline. So a very busy label is
easy to print, but a labelwhich has one solid color is difficult.
You can see anything on that,and that's we did a lot of software
upgrades on that, and that's nowactually working really well. Look at We
had by of samples at the highLimb show and I think it was very
(30:03):
well received. Awesome cool. Youmentioned that part of the problem is getting
the material out to the edges,so similarly to pressing plants, how is
how is the incidence of like nonfill and stitching and like our all our
favorite errors in the QC department,it's not there. We don't have no
(30:26):
problem with that. Wow, becauseyou're and your stampers are thinner. How
I mean, I have so manyquestions when it comes to like putting the
stamper in and then like having dustin between the stamper and the mold,
and then that you know, lookslike orange peel, and then you've got
all these other like random like actualmechanical physical errors that can happen. So
(30:49):
how is that? So AAR stamplesare very flat, which which helps a
lot with the process. Before wedo that, we wipe them with alcohol,
the backside side with a limb freewhite. Then we mount them into
the mob both sides of the moldmore clothes. We do a couple of
shots and typically that takes out anydust or impurities out of it. The
(31:12):
only things which can happen is if, for example, the molding machine cooled
down overnight and there's some hard materialin there. You will immediately see that
on the record. But for therest ones, that's why it stays on
a very equal temperature constantly. Evenif it's shut down, it keeps the
(31:33):
material still somewhat warm. You havethe same problem that we did CDs.
But yeah, for for molding,we don't have that stitching air issue or
orange piel, none of that.Wow, Yeah, those QC departments must
have a pretty easy day then.Yeah, I was going to ask this
(31:55):
QC looking to mostly make sure stampersare correct than that type of thing,
you know, that kind of stuff, and you can even automate that a
little bit with some software, buttypically, you know, you what what
we do is we listen to acouple of full records and then we do
spot checks making sure that everything staysthe same. You know, where the
(32:20):
problems are leading lead out and thesilence between songs, that's definitely where it
happens. So what sort of overallimpact do you think that this technology could
have on the industry and the environmentif it were to be more adopted.
Good one, you know one,of course the material it yes, PVC
(32:43):
is what it is, and thepops used in Europe is already multiple times
better than what's used in as you'reactually also here in the US, some
of the stuff used here still assome lead in there and some top you
know, stabilizers in that which arenot needed. It's it's I think one
(33:07):
of the big steps to to dosomething better. Of course, there is
biovinyl, which is a good stepin the right direction. Evolution is making
big steps into you know, aa different type of plastic for biodegradable plastic
(33:28):
p l A. I believe itis p h A and great steps.
I think everybody has to do thatbest in doing something for the environment.
I of course believe that we madethe biggest step into that and and hopefully
it will be adapted by more andmore people that eventually, once you know,
the all the machines are getting reallyold, that instead of going stick
(33:52):
sticking with PVC, that they willswitch MHM and hopefully maybe the artists will
demand that. So you know,we we don't want that anymore. We
want something better. When you're gettinglonger life out of stampers too, because
you're not using pressure on them,right, So I mean that that's a
huge part right there, because youknow, you don't have to make infinite
(34:13):
amount of stampers now they're lasting forI think you said between five and ten
thousand copies, correct, definitely,So I mean that imagine the savings you
know, if you stamper copy ofstamper average cost but you're looking still at
sixty dollars sixty to seventy dollars perper side, and they traditionally last what
(34:34):
twelve hundred and fifteen hundred shots.It's big savings. And not only that,
also the mold. You know,a traditional mold lasts the year before
it you know, starts leaking andgets issues. Ours has been in there
for four years now given continuously running. But the yeah, there's there's no
(35:00):
degassing of the material. There's nochlorides which slowly eat eat your mold and
your stampers well, and just thatmechanical pressure of smashing things together, well
you'll with things out over time forsure. The molding used is also used
in in you know, in automotiveindustry and all kind of you know,
(35:22):
generic purposes. So the cycle timewe have is so slow that because I
asked, what are the wearing airparts in the molding machine, and he
started laughing and said, well,you might need a motor in twenty years.
So I was like, okay,that's great to know, but so
wear in there for those type ofmachines, they're so rigid. It's it's
(35:44):
so slow. I mean, inthe in our industry is fast twenty seconds,
but in generic molding it's it's slow. I mean the CD has made
every three set three and a halfseconds since the traditional stampers. I think
some people listening may be curious toknow, like, is the beginning process
the same, then how are yougetting to your stampers exactly the same.
(36:06):
So we get we had laquers froma whole variety of cutters, we get
them here in the in our facility, and we do the same thing.
We silver them. Uh, wedo slow plates and then fast plates,
bunch, polish and form them.That's it. Do you foresee that being
some technology that you'll try to lookinto as well, considering that lacquer manufacturing
(36:30):
is also a scary situation. Yes, we are working on laquers. It's
I know, the first time onthis everybody Bookmark forty five episodes, the
first time anybody has ever said anythingabout we're doing this thing. If we've
(36:53):
seen we're seeing it like, ohmy god, this is just a disaster
to happen. M hm. Butyou know you're abe to have d m
M in the US. It's noteither not popular. I mean we've never
got a request for that. Well, that was going to be. My
next question is like how heavy,Like how beneficial would it be to just
(37:15):
have metal work done immediately, likecut metal for your processing. Yes,
that would be definitely possible. WhatI've and I'm not an expert in it,
but what I've heard from from Rena'swho just was fifty years in the
(37:38):
industry cutting, he said, youknow, some music is better on lackers
and some is better on metal,and he has preference, and when I
hear the music, I go.He decides, he says, Okay,
this is way better on metal,and ourself is way better on lackers.
The US is predominantly lackers. Imean, we haven't gotten any any stampers
(38:04):
inform made for metal. I thinkthere's only maybe eight total lathes in the
U in the continental US that havethe capability to cut metal. Maybe and
it might even before, but Imean it is true, and everybody that's
listening we can talk to. Wecan reference the episode that Jet was talking
(38:25):
about where they did a one toone of the same band that shall not
be named on laquer and d MM and that kind of quality. What
I've heard from my mastering journey isthat euro music has always been better in
d m M because of like thehigh frequencies and like the more aggressive high
(38:47):
frequency response for d m M,and where in the North America is where
we use a lot more like acousticinstruments like drums and bass and less SYNTHI
material, it's better with the Lacquerbecause it allows you a little bit more
with Yeah, it's sex of plenty, you said up because last Saturday,
the Vinyl Alliance did a little comparisonand I don't have the ears for it,
(39:15):
and I'm not trained, but therewere quite a few a couple of
audio engineers in there, A coupleof ladies from from Sony were there and
they had the d m M there. They had a regular mass stamper from
Lacquer there, they had a aVinyl there and they were just switching between
(39:39):
the three same players everything up andthe switching was, you know, maybe
not always perfect, and it wasnot a lap setup, but it was
really interesting how close everything was together. The eventually we figured out that the
d m M was a little loa little almost a little brighter on the
(40:04):
best. That's kind of the onlything we and I could hear. And
then most people there, but itwas cool to see cool, very cool
to hear. It was a reallynice project. Was very well. I
like that. I love that.Yeah, I'd like to do something like
that as well for people to hear, because it is I think the lacquer
has a little bit like of awarmer. Yeah. Yeah, Well we're
(40:28):
getting close on time. So didyou have anything else, Robin? Well,
we've kind of gone through all ofour like technical questions. Uh,
Pierre, I want to know aboutyour record collection. Are you a prolific
collector as well? Did you howdid you decide that you were going to
come into this and go like thisis my whole life now, because we've
(40:51):
all had that like little moment wherewe're like, you know what, I
like these weird plastic discs. Ithink I'm going to devote my whole rooms
of my houses to this and ofmy paychecks. So when it wasn't in
Ellen's, I had a reasonable therewas a young kid. I didn't have
that much funny but a good collection. And I've actually asked my mother,
(41:12):
I was there last week, andso where is it? She goes,
I don't know, so I havestill have to look for it. But
I restarted when I did this,I really was like, well, wait
a minute. I had this oldrecord from you know, Michael Jackson back
in the days, and I hadan white el Elvis album. I gotta
find that. So I've been goingthrough second hand stores and of course whatever
(41:32):
we make here, I've got nowmyself at least in the office. Let's
prove it that way. Uh.We do a lot more than just final
We have a few other other businesseswe are and this is definitely the sex
yier part of our business. That'sfor sure, way more fun than anything
(41:53):
else. I mean, you havea small printing company, U doos T
shirts, so we make you know, our own green vinyl shirts. We
we have a company makes does everythingfor eyeglasses, so all your lenses,
all the coatings. On top ofthat the shapes we sell lenses, et
cetera. And then we still havethe traditional CD DVD industry. We supply
(42:16):
with raw materials as spare parts.But that Finalists is way more sex to
people are way more creative. It'sso much more fun. That's great.
I definitely enjoyed it. I mean, that's that's that's the key to all
of this advancement and innovation, rightis having passionate people in these spaces,
(42:38):
I mean, and then having agovernment that was interested in helping you guys
figure it out. That's I thinkone of the one of the big parts
for sure. How has the receptionbeen in the States, Actually pretty good.
We may make some pretty decent artists. I think the largest one was
(42:59):
our friends from Zach Brown band.We did the triple album here the the
group we're working now. They're locatedin California working with they are super excited
and you know, people are involvedout of the music site UH and also
(43:21):
out of the environmental side, sothat it's kind of the good combination for
us that that we found people whoare a have been musicians or our producers
right now and and know a lotof artists and the people who are you
know, do presentations at the UN and and UH all a couple of
(43:43):
weeks ago in New York and aresuper passionate about anything sustainability and environment good
combination for us, and we loveto be parking with them. It's going
to be great. Who's North Carolina? Like you're first pick of locations?
Like did they have a like asituation that was more I guess friendly for
(44:07):
like a new industry to kind ofcome in. No, No, I
mean this is where we have ourheadquarters were located here. We have about
fifty thousand square foot building here.We also make stampers, for example,
for the CD and DVD industry,So so we already have most of the
technology here. It just made senseto place it here. And you know,
(44:30):
my is because you know when whenfirst Phillips and Sony invented the the
CD PNBC, the pump was hereand you mentioned the un which just gave
me a quick question, So whatabout run sizes? Can you do lower
(44:51):
run sizes? Because of that,I can make one, but it just
doesn't make sense. You know,your stampers, your lackers are so expensive,
and so that's that's the question,Like what is what is the optimal
run size for? And how arelike if I was a band right now
and I wanted to get a runof green vinyl meat, how would I
do that? Fairly simple? Justyou know, they can contact me directly
(45:16):
and we stick kind of with threehundred. Financially wise, it just makes
sense with the cost of your stampers, the cost of your lackers, et
cetera. A hard part with lowervolumes. Is your printed artwork, you
know, your jackets to sleeves stillwhite sleep. There's not many people who
(45:38):
do that. They start from froma thousand, one thousand and up.
What I see most there's a lotof bands who do like five hundred super
interesting local, local guys, butwe see more one thousand to two thousand
records. That's that's kind of whereeverybody it's it's affordable, you know,
(46:02):
they can oversee the sales a lotof these guys. I mean we ship.
We've done shippings to UH to everycity band was playing in. You
know, are send me a boxto this hotel, send a box of
that hotel, just sort of withthem, which is kind of cool.
And then we actually brought records toUH to a concert in Charleston. Really
(46:29):
cool. Yeah, but no,I think if you look at the overall
costs with laquer stampers, your printedart, your your artwork, one thousands,
two two thousands, is a perfectrun size. Yeah awesome. And
then of course we do family making, so we we typically keep them out
it on stock and then we canyou know, run another stamper if the
(46:52):
if the old one get damaged orit's not usable anymore. Okay, so
I guess the last question that wealways ask is if you could make your
very own seven inch record, becauseas we've discussed their best records, and
you can make a custom one whereyou have anything on your A side and
anything on your B side, theperfect PR mixtape. O. What would
(47:15):
that? What would be your Awhat would be your b? Oh?
Gee, that's that's a hard question. I know, it's the most perplexing
one I've ever come up with.And I'm so proud November Rain see this
(47:37):
is my We're friends. Absolutely mybirthday is a November. But it's still
probably one of the best performances I'veever seen. We're just song yeah that
I don't know. A CDC songon the backside would be great rippers if
you're listenings from Green Vinyl of aninch, thank you very much. If
(48:01):
you guys are hopefully next year wehave it here. But if you ever
in the Netherlands close to Aint Oven, let us know you're more than welcome
to see the machine in life,no problem, thank you. Yeah,
that's awesome. We were trying tobe there for Harlem, but yeah,
you missed a good show. Itwas one of the better ones and and
(48:22):
Harlm is pretty. It's a greatlittle little city. Hopefully next year.
Yeah, I'll tell Brian to redoit in we can stand in ux house.
It'll be great. Well, thankyou so much, Pierre. This
is great. So I really appreciateyour time. Was it was fun.
(48:44):
It was you know, it waslike, Okay, what are they going
to ask? But we're just goingto ask your form hellos and all of
your technical specs and then we havea little patent on I was. I
was curious though, do you havehave like audio recordings or anything like a
sample or something that you give outthat you could send us that we could
(49:06):
record and just put at the endof the episodes so people can hear what
they sound like. Sure, there'sactually our friends from Katie g. You
have done a A B comparison.I'll get the I think it's also on
LinkedIn, but I'll send it toyou guys, or and I'll send you
some records. I'd love to sharethem so people can see. I'm sure
which it is, but I mean, good, Yeah, you got a
(49:32):
nice collection, mind you. That'sawesome. But it's also a benefit and
working in this industry, you getall these music you've never heard of and
you're you listen to and like wow, yeah, right, well, thank
you guys so much. It wasit was fun. Thank you do it
again when we start to set themup in all these factories. Huh yeah
(49:54):
that sounds great, great idea.All right, take care, Thank you
again. Bye, and now here'sa sample of how these records sound.
(50:16):
Double hate small in my brain lately. Things don't see the sun. I'm
acting funny, but I don't knowwhy. Excuse me whilea kiss the sky.
(50:52):
Sometimes I'm right and I can bewrong. My own beliefs air in
my song. Then, thanks forjoining us on the Women of Vinyl podcast.
You can join our ever growing listof sponsors other record labels Selector,
(51:15):
Copple Design, Eargasm, Groove Washer, Glowtronics, New Gen Audio, and
Vinyl Revolution Record Show and thanks forsponsoring the show. Hey. As always,
you can join our conversation on Instagramor send us a note at media
at Women in Vinyl dot com.Clock us, send us info if you
(51:37):
have a question, Yo, wegot the answer or we'll find it.
We won't let you and check outWomen in Vinyl dot com for past episodes.
The store, the job board,and the library of resources. Don't
forget to like and subscribe and giveus a review on your favorite podcast delivery
method. You can also contribute tofurthering our mission dot com slash Women in
(52:00):
Vinyl. Hey guess what this episodeforty five minutes? You know there was
more? You want more? Youget more. Go to patreon dot com
and you can get more and you'llfind all the b sides, the deep
cuts, and the amazing extras,including longer episodes, and contribute to the
creation of scholarships and educational opportunities tofurther the demastification the infiltration of more women
(52:25):
and non binary identifying humans into thevinyl making space, decrease in those turnaround
times every week. Yeah, welove your records. We want you to
love them too, Women in Vinyldot com. This episode has been brought
to you by Women in Vinyl andRed Spade Records. Thank you for listening.
(52:45):
Please remember to subscribe and you canalways contact us directly by visiting www.
Dot Women in Vinyl dot com
Welcome to the Women in Vinyl Podcastwith Jen Dugenia, founder of Women in
Vinyl, and contributor Robin Raymond.This podcast facilitates conversations with those working in
the vinyl record industry to educate,demystify, and diversify the vinyl community.
(00:37):
You can call me doragmatic, sensa bullet, pragmatic and intellect ghost contacting,
pseudo spiritual. You could sound dramatic. I have been known to hathematic
attacks. I'm so self critical Ahint navety, I got the maner who
(01:04):
is with? I'm sentimental, abrasional. I have my grandfather Spain sing b
It's be easy onesome. Thank youfor joining us on episode forty five of
the Women in Vinyl Podcast. Youjust heard winter lining by Canadian artist q
(01:30):
Varrow of her upcoming album Cowboy Witchcraft, being released on Robin's new Red Spade
Records label. Find more on thelabel, launch, ques album, and
where to purchase the physical release viawww. Dot Qvarrow dot bandcamp dot com
and also at Redspaderecords dot com.In this episode, we are sitting down
(01:51):
with Pierre Vandongjen from Green Vinyl,a conversation we've wanted to have and share
with you all for a long time. Green Vinyl is working to innovate the
vinyl manufacturing process by developing an environmentallyfriendly and alternative production process for vinyl records.
It's replacing traditional plastics for eco friendlymaterials. Learn more about their innovation
(02:15):
and record pressing, where things standnow, and ways in which we can
help advance a more eco friendly productthat we will all still enjoy in the
same way for years to come.Thank you so much for joining us.
We have been excited to have thisconversation for a while, so I'm glad
we were able to make it happen. And we'll sort of just dive right
(02:35):
in. So tell us a littlebit about you. How you found your
way into the industry. Yeah,so I've originally out of the CD DVD
industry. Started in the Netherlands ata company called odme Will made equipment to
(02:55):
produce CDs and DVDs. They broughtme to the US and through you know,
quite a few years in that industry. We started. Me and three
of my friends, all Dutch guys, started for ourselves in the CD and
DVD industry. So we mostly didsecond hand equipment for CDs and DVDs became
(03:20):
very quickly one of the larger resellerof that used equipment. We were also
the only ones who would install itapp factories with no risk and trained people
train the whole facility. So twentysixteen we got a lot of requests suddenly
for secondhand vinyl equipment, you know, and of course very very little available.
(03:46):
And what was there was, youknow, really old. I mean
most of it got scrapped in thelate eighties. So we've you know,
we got that question once twice,three times, and then we started thinking
like, wow, what's what's goingon? So we dove a little bit
more into it. And one ofmy my business partner's harm Tennis, is
(04:08):
a very very experienced molding engineer,and it was like this is this is
weird. We should look at thatin a different way. So he found
a big arm how do you callhim old old Phillips video disc mold,
put that in a molding machine,did a one sided stamper from a vinyl
(04:32):
stamper against it, injected some Ithink the first one was PVC or so
or no not PC polygonnate into itand it worked. You could play it
and that kind of was the startof it. So we started developing a
new method of making make up vinylrecords in a in an injection molding way
(04:56):
that that was already done in thelate eighties. I think in Japan did
a lot of research to that,but I got put in the in the
fridge because you know, the theCD came up and vinyl was on a
downturn, so they really did notcontinue that that research. So we that's
kind of how we we got intothe final world. We started off with
(05:21):
that. We after a lot ofrequests, we received a grant from the
European Union from the Dutch government todo some more research on it together with
quite a few different companies and uhthat that went actually pretty well. So
now we have a a molded recordout of pet and which is recyclable.
(05:54):
It's less damaging. Also on thestampers, if you can imagine, you
know, the traditionally you kind ofrolled the bucket PVCT from the inside to
the outside and you're pushing against theinside of the of the groups. With
molding, you inject very very hotplastic and believe it something like three hundred
(06:14):
degreesius into a mold that closes coolsoff real quickly and that slicisfies the record,
so the sample lifetime is a lotlonger. Also, I think we're
up to over ten thousand shots ona set of stampers right now. But
the goal was to make it makerecords either at equal or maybe if possible
(06:39):
better sound quality than the traditional ones, same feel, you know, almost
no difference to the end user.That was the goal, but at a
lot of lower costs and lower energyuses your usage. So we had it
actually a month ago. We hadit qualified by an independent laboratory and with
(07:01):
the dryers, the printer, thewhole molding system, everything connected, we
use less than zero point two kilowatthour per record. Wow. Compare that
to for one hundred and eighty gramsrecord traditionally you're probably at a two point
eight to two point nine killow Sohuge savings. You know, everybody wants
(07:27):
to get get better for the environmentand and do their do their best,
so that was a huge step.Next to that, we also thought,
well all the labels, uh,you know that that's a lot of paper
also not great for the environment.So we have a developed a direct to
(07:49):
record printer, so we print directlyon the record. Uh, you know,
A, we don't use any paperanymore, use very little ink to
UV cure blink. Also completely recyclablein the system, and you can do
that on demand. So if youdo five hundred records, you need just
(08:11):
five hundred prints and not you know, like with the labels now you probably
have to order five and thirty orfive and forty labels from both sides.
So that that was you know,it's a big a big savings and also
a better for the environment. Sowhat does it actually look like? Because
I think a lot of listeners areused to or understand the process of you
(08:33):
know, we're putting stampers in themachine, we're pressing the park. You
know, the labels are in themachine. Is this Does this look similar
to that process and how these aremade? Yes and no. So the
stampers are are exactly well almost thesame. They're surrounded right. No.
(08:54):
No, the stampers are made thesame as for traditional vinyl. So it's
we do that here in Pineville inour office here. The only difference is
that we don't have to form themtypically form them the outside and coin them
on the inside. For either aPhoenix Alfa or two legs or a you
(09:16):
know, viral mold. Ours arecompletely flat because they are put into a
mold, they have to be Theirflatness has to be very yeah, equal
on all sides, on the inside, outside, and on the four quadrants.
So we go with a two hundredand fifty nimeter thickness. Whereas traditionally
(09:39):
everybody just weighs the stamper. Itdoesn't matter if they're thicken on the inside
outside. That creates, you know, sometimes a little process problems to get
everything correct. But the stampers aresaying nickel. So the what happens is
the cristal, the molding machine willmount stampers, the molding machine will close
its more. We inject a hotplastic pet into that with a cooling channel.
(10:07):
We cool that off real fast.The molt opens, a robot takes
them out, then it gets cooledfor a couple of steps, and that
same robot takes a record which isalready cooled, and puts it into the
printer. I can actually send you, guys a video that makes maybe a
little bit more sense, or it'savailable on LinkedIn. Our LinkedIn patients pretty
(10:28):
much all the videos, so it'sall completely automated, you really don't need
any people anymore to handle anything,so we don't have to trim anything off
of it. The only little wasteor stuff we can recycle is a small
sprew on the inside which is noteven a grammar so and we can regrind
(10:54):
it put it back into the system, so kind of like a pin slash.
Yeah, yeah, it's it's theThe process is very, very similar
to make a CD. It's justbigger, cool, interesting. And so
what is that cycle time? Likecycle time is just below twenty seconds?
I think you had nineteen point eight. Typically we just run flat twenty seconds
(11:20):
and so three every minute. Yeah, I mean a little scary that it
would eliminate so many heer, we'retrying to find jobs for people. Luckily
there's a lot of you know,to be honest, the more important jobs
(11:43):
for quality control, people who listento the records, packaging. Still you
know, mainly it's you can automateit a little bit, but you know,
to do that right, you stillhave to have a lot of people.
Yeah, but yeah, it isyou know, kind of on one
(12:05):
side. Yeah, you need lesspeople pretty much. We say one operator
for two machines two maybe three ifyou run a really big, big order
but safely said as one operator fortwo, Well, and how much like
what's this? What's the footprint ofeach of each machine? So like we've
all seen kind of the inside ofa pressing plant and what that looks like.
(12:26):
Is it similar smaller? It's definitelyquite a bit bigger. Yeah,
you probably could fit at least twotraditional practice presses on the spot, which
you know, if you roughly said, you know, a traditional press can
(12:46):
do around five hundred thousand records ayear. Ours can do a million plus.
So all in all that that comparesto each other. What about the
amount that you can fit because theprocess is are you able to fit more
on the stampers or is it stillthe same amount of music? It's exactly
the same the final record. Ifyou really look at the record, they're
(13:11):
a little bit sturdier because the ptdoesn't flexor actually doesn't change form after you
cool it. There's also a benefit, you know, if you I've had
one laying in my front window inmy car for the summer, just to
check it out and see if itworked, and it just stays the same.
(13:31):
But the only real difference is ithas a square edge on the outer
edge, so it's not tapered,it's it's square the only if you really
look at it, that's what peoplesay. Hey, wait a minute,
that's the different I see. Yeah, Well, and I cut PET,
so I'm familiar with it as well. And you guys actually gave me some
(13:52):
to test cut, so it's inthere. It's in the cue of things
to do. But it's getting downthere into the lathe cut community too,
which is kind of cool because Imean, having having petg has been has
been pretty awesome because it is recyclable, so I worry less about my my
(14:13):
footprint because of my errors in cuttingand stuff too. So yeah, and
those are a little bit different PETthan what we use for molding, just
because of you know, the heatingof the needle or your your stylers.
And then how would cuts, howhow would flake? So how do you
(14:33):
call that curls? We've we've donequite a few research on that too,
and I think we have something whichhas a fairly decent noise floor. I
mean at least not like like theones you get get kind of cut out
of the big sheets of flat PET. They're still wavy, there's still been
(14:56):
rolled so but we do make doesthe same actually as the record regular records,
just only with at Stamfords, butnothing on there. Yeah, it's
great. And to put it sortof plainly for people like is this recyclable
in a way where they could likeput it in in there? Yeah,
(15:16):
like a record sucks, I'm goingto put it in the recycle ben.
Or is it like after some timeit's going to it's not going to last
like a normal record will for thousandsof years. Actually it will. So
we've done some reason. We getan audio engineer, grab a record and
play that song over and over andover again and recorder it every I think
(15:41):
twenty or thirty plays, and thereis he could only see a sound degradation
after foreigner times playing Wow, comparedto a regular record, you're looking at
probably sixty seventy times. And itis because the material in principle is harder.
Uh, pet's a little bit moredurable. So and I always say,
(16:06):
like, you know who's going torecycle their records? I mean I
see a whole bunch behind you.You will never if you do anything,
you give it to somebody else,or you sell them, or you're never
going to throw those away. It'smore in the I think, in the
production process where where the recycling comesinto play, and in the overproduction you
(16:26):
know, where where for example,we've made so many Adele records and they
didn't they didn't sell all and it'sof course easier to recycle and put it
into a different pt product you know, you know, you know, a
storage container, a bottle, anythinglike that. But it is possible to
(16:48):
especially black, to just regrind thatstick it back in well. And I
think that would be the next questionfor everybody, because the question that I
got from when I was telling peoplethat we were going to enter it was
like, oh, but what ifI don't like green? And I was
like, no, it's not thatall of the records are green, they're
(17:08):
recycled or being they're able to upcycle. So is there still the myriad of
colors and does it have to bea solid color? Are there effects that
are possible with injections? So ourbeginning material is completely blank, so it's
it's see through. You can alsodo uh you know, make those and
(17:32):
you can there actually you can seestraight through it. It's like a glass
glass, blank paint. What wedo before the plastic pellets go into the
barrel, they get a little bitof dye and that dye makes the color
so either black, red, green, and they can do opaque or translucent.
So you know, here's a translucentred my favorite. There. Oh
(17:57):
nice anything, and I actually likethe purple. Purple looks also, yeah,
that's pretty. And so there's there'sa tiny little bit of dye into
this which follows the palace of PTand then it melts and you get one
(18:17):
color. That's super simple. Actually, we also don't have to have,
you know, twenty thirty different colorson stock. We just have one big
bag of PT and a couple ofcans of dye and that's that's how I
do it. So what do youthink that it will take at this point
for the industry and consumer to fullyembrace this process? Artists, I think,
(18:41):
uh, we see that this.Of course, there is a big
pushback from the traditional vinyl manufacturing plants, and understandably so it's also not a
replacement of that, it's an addition. We we feel that the artist has
(19:03):
to push this, and we're talkingto several large artists who say, yes,
we need to do something for ourenvironment. And it is more important
than just money, you know,and there's especially in Highland also. We
had a lot of discussions and alot of presentations about you know, how
can we be more sustainable, howcan we get greener you know, less
(19:26):
energy, and there's a lot ofideas and plans, but the biggest issue
is as soon as that release datecomes closer, it goes out the door,
you know. Then then yeah,we're not going to look for a
you know, a transport which ischeap or which is better for the environment.
Now it needs to get there,so we're gonna fly it. That's
(19:49):
the whole idea has to be pushedby the by the artist, and when
the artist wants that, then itwill happen. And the good part is
that this this method is also verycompetitive in price. Yeah, that would
be my next question. Yeah.Yeah, I'm working in a record store
(20:12):
three times a week. That's Imean, I hear it all the time,
and as part of the sales teamwhere I'm buying new records and we're
watching the prices from the majors increasetime after time, and you're looking at
what you had this record for youknow, three months ago, and you're
reordering it and now it's you know, fifteen or twenty percent more. How
(20:33):
does that Where does that part ofthe conversation come in? Where are you
approaching? Are you talking to thelabels or to the artists directly and saying
like, here's the problem, youcan do it both both. The labels
are of course very interested, butI think the artists we're talking, we're
(20:56):
currently talking to, they will decide. I mean, you also to see
that more artists want to be incontrol of their own music and their own
production, their own media out there. You see that Metallica, you know,
joining with Furnace, I mean Metallica, say, is one of the
first ones who really start doing that. And we hope that that with us,
(21:22):
that that will happen the same withone or two big artists. And
we're just hoping that Taylor Swift getsa piece of green vinyl in her robust
and then it's all good. Right, that will pretty much do it for
everybody. Yeah, I mean,somebody from that caliber that will definitely help.
Okay, well, how do wedo that? We were working on
(21:44):
that, that's for sure. Imean, we we work together with a
group and there's some let's said,very very well known artists involved, and
hopefully next year we'll we will havea system here in the US or multiple
(22:07):
You all know by now that Robinand I are on opposite ends of the
record organizational spectrum. But one thingwe do agree on is how fantastic Keuple
designs. Record dividers and record blocksare beautifully handcrafted by expert craftswomen in San
Francisco. Kepel dividers are sleek,sophisticated, customizable and built to last no
(22:29):
matter how you organize. Kepple arethe dividers to use. Get ten dollars
off your first order of eighty fivedollars or more using code women in Vinyl
at checkout www dot kepeldesign dot com. That's k O E P p e
l design dot com. And nowback to the episode. So if a
(22:56):
pressing plant wanted to invest in havingsomething like this, is it something that
they could reach out to you andand try to set up getting a machine
or a system or is it atthis stage you're developing it for the artist
level. So at this moment wewe decided that let's let's first do it
ourselves. We have one basilion theNetherlands where where we have the Betelan machine.
(23:23):
The next one will be here inCharlotte. That's Q one next year
if everything goes well, and thenwe'll build on that. So we can
first let's let's get this bigger andmore more acceptable by the by the general
public and the artists and and thestudios, and then we'll we'll take the
(23:45):
next step. But for now,we decided that we we wanted to keep
it in house. We've you know, my my business partners all have to
be have been service engineers and technicians. And they said, well, really,
I don't want to travel that muchanymore. Yeah, they don't,
(24:06):
you know, they're getting a littlebit older, have kids, and they
said, well, we prefer tobe at home instead of on the road,
because these guys were definitely road warriorsin their younger days. Yeah.
Well, I mean a great placeto have it is the Netherlands because there's
some really robust labels there and inEurope specifically. So I'm sure that because
(24:27):
the governments are still much more progressiveover there, that there's probably some incentives
government wise to subsidize some things forartists to be able to do that.
Yeah. Yeah, I don't haveheard. I haven't heard from any subsidies
for artists. But you know,one of the big things in Europe,
(24:48):
they were way further there than herein the US. The CO two tax.
You know, that's a big,big chunk, and that's only going
to be bigger. The Netherlands isone of the the main pushes for that.
Typically Denolence UH wants to be thebest kid in the class, so
(25:10):
they're they're very progressive in getting everybodyof the natural gas, you know,
all sustainable energy heat exchanges into houses, et cetera. So they pushed that
a lot. And once you know, if you look at the savings just
on the CO two and the energy, if you know, ninety three percent
less CO two, it's also ninetythree percent less CO two text you have
(25:36):
to pay. So there's that mightbe a big incentive for finally the the
the whole vinyl community to switch.And you're saying it it's a potential as
like a bolt on into an existingplant, right, like do you you
would you use the same infrastructure forchillers and things like that, so so
(25:56):
you don't need the the boilers anymore, So don't use any natural gas.
What we need is is a moldingmachine in the printer. You have a
PT drying system because PT typically wantsto collect moisture instead of get rid of
it. So you have that.You have a air compressor, you have
(26:18):
a chilled water system, close loop, and that's it. There's no natural
gas, no steam boilers, noexpensive piping, et cetera. It's just
electricity. Yeah, that's awesome,it's great. Aside from I'm sure what
would be tons of hype stickers ifsomeone did move forward with this, What
(26:41):
would the consumer know the difference?Like if they put it on their turntable,
what would be the difference if anyNothing. So there's no like calibration
or anything. No, nothing.You know, probably ninety percent of the
people won't even see it or hearit or feel any different until you start
really looking at it, like,Okay, it's got a square edge and
(27:06):
feels maybe a little bit different,but the weight is the same. We
can't do anything else about more eightyI That's that's what it is. What
about are you going to do sevenswe haven't made. Actually should be way
(27:26):
easier to do than the twelve inchbecause the the you know, the the
hardest part is getting all that liquidplastic to the outside of the of the
mold. Seven inches would be Imean, it's just a little bit bigger
than the CD not that hard,so that it is a step we will
definitely do. We will just haveto make a different mold for that most
(27:51):
size. Yeah, but yes,you I mean if you feel me and
you bend them a little bit,you could probably feel like, yeah,
this is a little bit different materialbecause it will straight back in the original
forums. Then yeah, the centerlabel thing is super interesting too. Yeah.
Well, I mean it's similar tothe record that a neck and Record
(28:15):
Industry did that looked like a stainedglass record. So it's it's that's the
same kind of printer. It's juston a you just have a smaller area
that they're printing. Is that correct? You're yes, I do have one.
So you have one, well notat off first, but I was
(28:36):
like, dude, they only madetwo hundred of those just printed straight on
there. Oh wow, And soyou're what, it's a digital printer.
So with I think there's twenty fourthirty six different heads on there, and
(28:57):
the record goes underneath it, itprints, it cures it with UV light,
then the robot flips it does theother side, we've we've tested it
out. Harm has actually got outthe center label, stuck it in for
a month and his diswasher it wentthrough every cycle and it was still there.
(29:18):
There was no difference, So therewas I thought, a pretty good
durability test. And for people sincepeople are listening and can't see, I
mean, it looks like a fullcolor center label, same size everything.
It's really cool and the like,if you have a very busy label,
that's easier because you you know,if you think about the printing head,
it has all these kind of littlechannels in there. If you miss one
(29:41):
little dot, you see a smallline. So a very busy label is
easy to print, but a labelwhich has one solid color is difficult.
You can see anything on that,and that's we did a lot of software
upgrades on that, and that's nowactually working really well. Look at We
had by of samples at the highLimb show and I think it was very
(30:03):
well received. Awesome cool. Youmentioned that part of the problem is getting
the material out to the edges,so similarly to pressing plants, how is
how is the incidence of like nonfill and stitching and like our all our
favorite errors in the QC department,it's not there. We don't have no
(30:26):
problem with that. Wow, becauseyou're and your stampers are thinner. How
I mean, I have so manyquestions when it comes to like putting the
stamper in and then like having dustin between the stamper and the mold,
and then that you know, lookslike orange peel, and then you've got
all these other like random like actualmechanical physical errors that can happen. So
(30:49):
how is that? So AAR stamplesare very flat, which which helps a
lot with the process. Before wedo that, we wipe them with alcohol,
the backside side with a limb freewhite. Then we mount them into
the mob both sides of the moldmore clothes. We do a couple of
shots and typically that takes out anydust or impurities out of it. The
(31:12):
only things which can happen is if, for example, the molding machine cooled
down overnight and there's some hard materialin there. You will immediately see that
on the record. But for therest ones, that's why it stays on
a very equal temperature constantly. Evenif it's shut down, it keeps the
(31:33):
material still somewhat warm. You havethe same problem that we did CDs.
But yeah, for for molding,we don't have that stitching air issue or
orange piel, none of that.Wow, Yeah, those QC departments must
have a pretty easy day then.Yeah, I was going to ask this
(31:55):
QC looking to mostly make sure stampersare correct than that type of thing,
you know, that kind of stuff, and you can even automate that a
little bit with some software, buttypically, you know, you what what
we do is we listen to acouple of full records and then we do
spot checks making sure that everything staysthe same. You know, where the
(32:20):
problems are leading lead out and thesilence between songs, that's definitely where it
happens. So what sort of overallimpact do you think that this technology could
have on the industry and the environmentif it were to be more adopted.
Good one, you know one,of course the material it yes, PVC
(32:43):
is what it is, and thepops used in Europe is already multiple times
better than what's used in as you'reactually also here in the US, some
of the stuff used here still assome lead in there and some top you
know, stabilizers in that which arenot needed. It's it's I think one
(33:07):
of the big steps to to dosomething better. Of course, there is
biovinyl, which is a good stepin the right direction. Evolution is making
big steps into you know, aa different type of plastic for biodegradable plastic
(33:28):
p l A. I believe itis p h A and great steps.
I think everybody has to do thatbest in doing something for the environment.
I of course believe that we madethe biggest step into that and and hopefully
it will be adapted by more andmore people that eventually, once you know,
the all the machines are getting reallyold, that instead of going stick
(33:52):
sticking with PVC, that they willswitch MHM and hopefully maybe the artists will
demand that. So you know,we we don't want that anymore. We
want something better. When you're gettinglonger life out of stampers too, because
you're not using pressure on them,right, So I mean that that's a
huge part right there, because youknow, you don't have to make infinite
(34:13):
amount of stampers now they're lasting forI think you said between five and ten
thousand copies, correct, definitely,So I mean that imagine the savings you
know, if you stamper copy ofstamper average cost but you're looking still at
sixty dollars sixty to seventy dollars perper side, and they traditionally last what
(34:34):
twelve hundred and fifteen hundred shots.It's big savings. And not only that,
also the mold. You know,a traditional mold lasts the year before
it you know, starts leaking andgets issues. Ours has been in there
for four years now given continuously running. But the yeah, there's there's no
(35:00):
degassing of the material. There's nochlorides which slowly eat eat your mold and
your stampers well, and just thatmechanical pressure of smashing things together, well
you'll with things out over time forsure. The molding used is also used
in in you know, in automotiveindustry and all kind of you know,
(35:22):
generic purposes. So the cycle timewe have is so slow that because I
asked, what are the wearing airparts in the molding machine, and he
started laughing and said, well,you might need a motor in twenty years.
So I was like, okay,that's great to know, but so
wear in there for those type ofmachines, they're so rigid. It's it's
(35:44):
so slow. I mean, inthe in our industry is fast twenty seconds,
but in generic molding it's it's slow. I mean the CD has made
every three set three and a halfseconds since the traditional stampers. I think
some people listening may be curious toknow, like, is the beginning process
the same, then how are yougetting to your stampers exactly the same.
(36:06):
So we get we had laquers froma whole variety of cutters, we get
them here in the in our facility, and we do the same thing.
We silver them. Uh, wedo slow plates and then fast plates,
bunch, polish and form them.That's it. Do you foresee that being
some technology that you'll try to lookinto as well, considering that lacquer manufacturing
(36:30):
is also a scary situation. Yes, we are working on laquers. It's
I know, the first time onthis everybody Bookmark forty five episodes, the
first time anybody has ever said anythingabout we're doing this thing. If we've
(36:53):
seen we're seeing it like, ohmy god, this is just a disaster
to happen. M hm. Butyou know you're abe to have d m
M in the US. It's noteither not popular. I mean we've never
got a request for that. Well, that was going to be. My
next question is like how heavy,Like how beneficial would it be to just
(37:15):
have metal work done immediately, likecut metal for your processing. Yes,
that would be definitely possible. WhatI've and I'm not an expert in it,
but what I've heard from from Rena'swho just was fifty years in the
(37:38):
industry cutting, he said, youknow, some music is better on lackers
and some is better on metal,and he has preference, and when I
hear the music, I go.He decides, he says, Okay,
this is way better on metal,and ourself is way better on lackers.
The US is predominantly lackers. Imean, we haven't gotten any any stampers
(38:04):
inform made for metal. I thinkthere's only maybe eight total lathes in the
U in the continental US that havethe capability to cut metal. Maybe and
it might even before, but Imean it is true, and everybody that's
listening we can talk to. Wecan reference the episode that Jet was talking
(38:25):
about where they did a one toone of the same band that shall not
be named on laquer and d MM and that kind of quality. What
I've heard from my mastering journey isthat euro music has always been better in
d m M because of like thehigh frequencies and like the more aggressive high
(38:47):
frequency response for d m M,and where in the North America is where
we use a lot more like acousticinstruments like drums and bass and less SYNTHI
material, it's better with the Lacquerbecause it allows you a little bit more
with Yeah, it's sex of plenty, you said up because last Saturday,
the Vinyl Alliance did a little comparisonand I don't have the ears for it,
(39:15):
and I'm not trained, but therewere quite a few a couple of
audio engineers in there, A coupleof ladies from from Sony were there and
they had the d m M there. They had a regular mass stamper from
Lacquer there, they had a aVinyl there and they were just switching between
(39:39):
the three same players everything up andthe switching was, you know, maybe
not always perfect, and it wasnot a lap setup, but it was
really interesting how close everything was together. The eventually we figured out that the
d m M was a little loa little almost a little brighter on the
(40:04):
best. That's kind of the onlything we and I could hear. And
then most people there, but itwas cool to see cool, very cool
to hear. It was a reallynice project. Was very well. I
like that. I love that.Yeah, I'd like to do something like
that as well for people to hear, because it is I think the lacquer
has a little bit like of awarmer. Yeah. Yeah, Well we're
(40:28):
getting close on time. So didyou have anything else, Robin? Well,
we've kind of gone through all ofour like technical questions. Uh,
Pierre, I want to know aboutyour record collection. Are you a prolific
collector as well? Did you howdid you decide that you were going to
come into this and go like thisis my whole life now, because we've
(40:51):
all had that like little moment wherewe're like, you know what, I
like these weird plastic discs. Ithink I'm going to devote my whole rooms
of my houses to this and ofmy paychecks. So when it wasn't in
Ellen's, I had a reasonable therewas a young kid. I didn't have
that much funny but a good collection. And I've actually asked my mother,
(41:12):
I was there last week, andso where is it? She goes,
I don't know, so I havestill have to look for it. But
I restarted when I did this,I really was like, well, wait
a minute. I had this oldrecord from you know, Michael Jackson back
in the days, and I hadan white el Elvis album. I gotta
find that. So I've been goingthrough second hand stores and of course whatever
(41:32):
we make here, I've got nowmyself at least in the office. Let's
prove it that way. Uh.We do a lot more than just final
We have a few other other businesseswe are and this is definitely the sex
yier part of our business. That'sfor sure, way more fun than anything
(41:53):
else. I mean, you havea small printing company, U doos T
shirts, so we make you know, our own green vinyl shirts. We
we have a company makes does everythingfor eyeglasses, so all your lenses,
all the coatings. On top ofthat the shapes we sell lenses, et
cetera. And then we still havethe traditional CD DVD industry. We supply
(42:16):
with raw materials as spare parts.But that Finalists is way more sex to
people are way more creative. It'sso much more fun. That's great.
I definitely enjoyed it. I mean, that's that's that's the key to all
of this advancement and innovation, rightis having passionate people in these spaces,
(42:38):
I mean, and then having agovernment that was interested in helping you guys
figure it out. That's I thinkone of the one of the big parts
for sure. How has the receptionbeen in the States, Actually pretty good.
We may make some pretty decent artists. I think the largest one was
(42:59):
our friends from Zach Brown band.We did the triple album here the the
group we're working now. They're locatedin California working with they are super excited
and you know, people are involvedout of the music site UH and also
(43:21):
out of the environmental side, sothat it's kind of the good combination for
us that that we found people whoare a have been musicians or our producers
right now and and know a lotof artists and the people who are you
know, do presentations at the UN and and UH all a couple of
(43:43):
weeks ago in New York and aresuper passionate about anything sustainability and environment good
combination for us, and we loveto be parking with them. It's going
to be great. Who's North Carolina? Like you're first pick of locations?
Like did they have a like asituation that was more I guess friendly for
(44:07):
like a new industry to kind ofcome in. No, No, I
mean this is where we have ourheadquarters were located here. We have about
fifty thousand square foot building here.We also make stampers, for example,
for the CD and DVD industry,So so we already have most of the
technology here. It just made senseto place it here. And you know,
(44:30):
my is because you know when whenfirst Phillips and Sony invented the the
CD PNBC, the pump was hereand you mentioned the un which just gave
me a quick question, So whatabout run sizes? Can you do lower
(44:51):
run sizes? Because of that,I can make one, but it just
doesn't make sense. You know,your stampers, your lackers are so expensive,
and so that's that's the question,Like what is what is the optimal
run size for? And how arelike if I was a band right now
and I wanted to get a runof green vinyl meat, how would I
do that? Fairly simple? Justyou know, they can contact me directly
(45:16):
and we stick kind of with threehundred. Financially wise, it just makes
sense with the cost of your stampers, the cost of your lackers, et
cetera. A hard part with lowervolumes. Is your printed artwork, you
know, your jackets to sleeves stillwhite sleep. There's not many people who
(45:38):
do that. They start from froma thousand, one thousand and up.
What I see most there's a lotof bands who do like five hundred super
interesting local, local guys, butwe see more one thousand to two thousand
records. That's that's kind of whereeverybody it's it's affordable, you know,
(46:02):
they can oversee the sales a lotof these guys. I mean we ship.
We've done shippings to UH to everycity band was playing in. You
know, are send me a boxto this hotel, send a box of
that hotel, just sort of withthem, which is kind of cool.
And then we actually brought records toUH to a concert in Charleston. Really
(46:29):
cool. Yeah, but no,I think if you look at the overall
costs with laquer stampers, your printedart, your your artwork, one thousands,
two two thousands, is a perfectrun size. Yeah awesome. And
then of course we do family making, so we we typically keep them out
it on stock and then we canyou know, run another stamper if the
(46:52):
if the old one get damaged orit's not usable anymore. Okay, so
I guess the last question that wealways ask is if you could make your
very own seven inch record, becauseas we've discussed their best records, and
you can make a custom one whereyou have anything on your A side and
anything on your B side, theperfect PR mixtape. O. What would
(47:15):
that? What would be your Awhat would be your b? Oh?
Gee, that's that's a hard question. I know, it's the most perplexing
one I've ever come up with.And I'm so proud November Rain see this
(47:37):
is my We're friends. Absolutely mybirthday is a November. But it's still
probably one of the best performances I'veever seen. We're just song yeah that
I don't know. A CDC songon the backside would be great rippers if
you're listenings from Green Vinyl of aninch, thank you very much. If
(48:01):
you guys are hopefully next year wehave it here. But if you ever
in the Netherlands close to Aint Oven, let us know you're more than welcome
to see the machine in life,no problem, thank you. Yeah,
that's awesome. We were trying tobe there for Harlem, but yeah,
you missed a good show. Itwas one of the better ones and and
(48:22):
Harlm is pretty. It's a greatlittle little city. Hopefully next year.
Yeah, I'll tell Brian to redoit in we can stand in ux house.
It'll be great. Well, thankyou so much, Pierre. This
is great. So I really appreciateyour time. Was it was fun.
(48:44):
It was you know, it waslike, Okay, what are they going
to ask? But we're just goingto ask your form hellos and all of
your technical specs and then we havea little patent on I was. I
was curious though, do you havehave like audio recordings or anything like a
sample or something that you give outthat you could send us that we could
(49:06):
record and just put at the endof the episodes so people can hear what
they sound like. Sure, there'sactually our friends from Katie g. You
have done a A B comparison.I'll get the I think it's also on
LinkedIn, but I'll send it toyou guys, or and I'll send you
some records. I'd love to sharethem so people can see. I'm sure
which it is, but I mean, good, Yeah, you got a
(49:32):
nice collection, mind you. That'sawesome. But it's also a benefit and
working in this industry, you getall these music you've never heard of and
you're you listen to and like wow, yeah, right, well, thank
you guys so much. It wasit was fun. Thank you do it
again when we start to set themup in all these factories. Huh yeah
(49:54):
that sounds great, great idea.All right, take care, Thank you
again. Bye, and now here'sa sample of how these records sound.
(50:16):
Double hate small in my brain lately. Things don't see the sun. I'm
acting funny, but I don't knowwhy. Excuse me whilea kiss the sky.
(50:52):
Sometimes I'm right and I can bewrong. My own beliefs air in
my song. Then, thanks forjoining us on the Women of Vinyl podcast.
You can join our ever growing listof sponsors other record labels Selector,
(51:15):
Copple Design, Eargasm, Groove Washer, Glowtronics, New Gen Audio, and
Vinyl Revolution Record Show and thanks forsponsoring the show. Hey. As always,
you can join our conversation on Instagramor send us a note at media
at Women in Vinyl dot com.Clock us, send us info if you
(51:37):
have a question, Yo, wegot the answer or we'll find it.
We won't let you and check outWomen in Vinyl dot com for past episodes.
The store, the job board,and the library of resources. Don't
forget to like and subscribe and giveus a review on your favorite podcast delivery
method. You can also contribute tofurthering our mission dot com slash Women in
(52:00):
Vinyl. Hey guess what this episodeforty five minutes? You know there was
more? You want more? Youget more. Go to patreon dot com
and you can get more and you'llfind all the b sides, the deep
cuts, and the amazing extras,including longer episodes, and contribute to the
creation of scholarships and educational opportunities tofurther the demastification the infiltration of more women
(52:25):
and non binary identifying humans into thevinyl making space, decrease in those turnaround
times every week. Yeah, welove your records. We want you to
love them too, Women in Vinyldot com. This episode has been brought
to you by Women in Vinyl andRed Spade Records. Thank you for listening.
(52:45):
Please remember to subscribe and you canalways contact us directly by visiting www.
Dot Women in Vinyl dot com
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Herd with Colin Cowherd
The Herd with Colin Cowherd is a thought-provoking, opinionated, and topic-driven journey through the top sports stories of the day.