Pet Shop Boys Community

Ramzy wrote: Sun 16 Feb 2025, 8:48 pm Thanks, Drico, I'm finding this thread so fascinating.

Beyond a vague idea that only some shops counted towards the charts when I was growing up, I didn't really understand exactly how the panel system worked until now. I'm guessing the locations of the shops was a closely guarded secret to avoid chart manipulation - but now that the system is obsolete, has anyone managed to find out which 250 shops dictated the charts for so long? Or did it in fact change regularly to cancel out any unforeseen biases within the supposedly representative sample they'd chosen?

Edit: I'm actually also wondering how sales certifications worked in a world where no one was sure how many copies a record had really sold. Was it done based on shipments, or simply divided down by the panel multiplier so that e.g. a platinum album was awarded for 18,000 panel sales (or whatever)?

I had it on good authority that Woolworths were all part of the chart return shops. I hated Woolworths with a passion. My local one never updated the chart racks and new releases were half-heartedly put out on a Tuesday afternoon if the shop girl felt like it. Always went to my local independent shop (Musicrafts in Witham Essex fact fans!) which in hindsight, wouldn't have counted towards chart positions.

Go West's third week was the sixth-biggest in their history, selling pretty much exactly the same as Suburbia did. Previous pages updated.

Drico One wrote: Mon 17 Feb 2025, 8:35 pm Go West's third week was the sixth-biggest in their history, selling pretty much exactly the same as Suburbia did. Previous pages updated.

Thoughts on where it might land in the TOTAL Estimated Retail Sales (Units) list?

I recently read that Go West sold over 200,000 in the UK. I'm plumping for 268,000.

MartinWright66 wrote: Tue 18 Feb 2025, 9:01 am

Drico One wrote: Mon 17 Feb 2025, 8:35 pm Go West's third week was the sixth-biggest in their history, selling pretty much exactly the same as Suburbia did. Previous pages updated.

Thoughts on where it might land in the TOTAL Estimated Retail Sales (Units) list?

I recently read that Go West sold over 200,000 in the UK. I'm plumping for 268,000.

I'd say somewhere behind What have I done to deserve this? but ahead of Suburbia.

Drico.

Just for completion, Go West fell to number 7 on its fourth week with panel sales of 1,568 - higher than Can you forgive her?'s debut week. The following week, it dropped three to 10, with panel sales of 999. It had 140,475 actual sales by the end of Q3, 1993 (so, the end of September). Can you forgive her? had 75,330 actual sales by the end of June.

Drico.

Does anyone know why Go West is the only single of the 1990s which only had 1 CD? all the other singles were either 2 or 3 CD sets.

It's not as if there weren't other remixes out there, I bought a US CD single with loads of different ones on it. Maybe the 2nd CD could have made the difference? would have sold more than 7" or cassette singles I would have thought.

Iyonix wrote: Thu 20 Feb 2025, 10:10 am Does anyone know why Go West is the only single of the 1990s which only had 1 CD? all the other singles were either 2 or 3 CD sets.

It's not as if there weren't other remixes out there, I bought a US CD single with loads of different ones on it. Maybe the 2nd CD could have made the difference? would have sold more than 7" or cassette singles I would have thought.

Technically DJ Culture didn't have a chart-eligible CD2 (DJculturemix was counted separately), and nor did Was It Worth It? - two of the three singles immediately preceding Go West - so it's not so unusual in context.

It's not so much about the 7" or cassette, which were still standard formats at that point (and I suspect the cassette in particular sold almost as many as the CD - not everyone had a CD player in 1993, and it was still a relatively expensive format that was largely unsupported in car stereos; cassettes were I think the best-selling format between 1988 and 1992). Rather, the 12" took up the slot for a remix format that might otherwise have gone to a second CD. Why they made that decision I don't know, but as I suggested earlier in the thread you'd think it might have had something to do with the performance of the Can you forgive her? 12", or perhaps other market insights that were being compiled by EMI at that point (maybe, say, remix CDs were less popular than 12"s for artists that could still expect to get decent DJ play in clubs). But yes, it'd be interesting to know for sure!

Ramzy wrote: Sun 16 Feb 2025, 8:48 pm Thanks, Drico, I'm finding this thread so fascinating.

Beyond a vague idea that only some shops counted towards the charts when I was growing up, I didn't really understand exactly how the panel system worked until now. I'm guessing the locations of the shops was a closely guarded secret to avoid chart manipulation - but now that the system is obsolete, has anyone managed to find out which 250 shops dictated the charts for so long? Or did it in fact change regularly to cancel out any unforeseen biases within the supposedly representative sample they'd chosen?

Edit: I'm actually also wondering how sales certifications worked in a world where no one was sure how many copies a record had really sold. Was it done based on shipments, or simply divided down by the panel multiplier so that e.g. a platinum album was awarded for 18,000 panel sales (or whatever)?

Apparently, the "chart returns" shops - those who had dataports introduced by Gallup in 1983 - were easily identifiable purely because of the dataports. Some hyping was easy enough in 1983. Gallup actually reduced the number of chart returns shops to 250, whereas the previous chart compiler BMRB actually had a panel of 750 which they rotated to 250. Their method of chart returns was more primitive and inefficient.

Sales returns were based on what was reported by the chart returns shops. The panel of 250 were multiplied in the 1980s by 17, in most years, to give the true number of actual record shops in the UK: approximately 4,250. When the industry suffered and shops closed down - such as in the early 1990s - the "multiplier" was reduced to 15. So, when we say Go West had 1,000 panel sales, that means it sold about 15,000 units.

Drico.

I wouldn't normally do this kind of thing missed out on two chart positions by a total of four panel sales on its second week in 1993. It landed at 13, but would have been number 12 (above M People's Don't Look Any Further) if it sold 31 more copies - or number 11 (above Meatloaf) if it sold 61 more copies. Agonising.

It wasn't too far from the top 10 - losing out to Dina Carroll's The Perfect Year by about 1,500 actual sales.

Earlier posts updated.

Drico.

Drico One wrote: Sun 02 Mar 2025, 6:50 pm I wouldn't normally do this kind of thing missed out on two chart positions by a total of four panel sales on its second week in 1993. It landed at 13, but would have been number 12 (above M People's Don't Look Any Further) if it sold 31 more copies - or number 11 (above Meatloaf) if it sold 61 more copies. Agonising.

It wasn't too far from the top 10 - losing out to Dina Carroll's The Perfect Year by about 1,500 actual sales.

Earlier posts updated.

Drico.

So I guess their appearance 3 days before the week 1 release at Children In Need wasn't enough exposure to get the average person out to buy a copy.

Thanks for the sneaky update Drico