Downtown Music Holdings’ CD Baby is announcing that it has paid out more than $1billion to its artists since the company’s 1998 founding. To achieve this, the company has empowered more than a million artists worldwide to distribute 10 million+ tracks to listeners. 

“For us, it’s not just about how much the top earners make, but also about what the payout means to all of the unique artists we work with who are charting their own course, based on their creative vision and their personal versions of success,” says CD Baby President Joel Andrew. “Our mission has always been to work as hard as possible to serve musicians dedicated to doing their own thing, their way. Our success is a reflection of their success.”  says Joel Andrew, president of the company.

“As an independent musician myself, I am just astounded and proud! It took us 6 years to get to our first million in payout but it took only 1 year to reach the second million landmark. That tells you a lot about how fast we’ve been growing.”

“Since we started we just saw a massive flow of independent musicians coming our way that needed help sorting out the business side of things and our goal has always been to reach as many of them as possible and help them as much as possible. That’s our mantra”

The $1-billion figure is more than a number to the artist services company; it’s a sign of the strength of the community of independent musicians and creators who have coalesced around CD Baby. Independent musicians like the ones CD Baby serves have grabbed an increasingly large market share of the music business. The independent music sector grew to more than 43% of the total global market by ownership in 2020 according to an October 2021 report from MIDiA. 

CD Baby has been a key player in this trend, as the first and one of the few remaining independent music distributors. Run largely by artists for artists, it has spent over two decades empowering independent musicians through industry-leading service, self-promotion tools, expert guidance, and strong partnerships with the world’s biggest music and social platforms. It has also devoted itself to in-depth education for independent artists, launching a wildly popular blog, the first podcast dedicated to DIY musician issues, and the first conference for independent musicians. 

“Our values has been established since day one: we recognize that any music you decide to put out through us represents the full and unadulterated expression of yourself first and foremost. Our office is populated mostly by music lovers or musicians who are going to address our customers’ issues the way they would help out their buddy’s band. That’s what makes us different!”

Joel started off his career as a punk rocker and touring musician living off a van before getting a law degree and joining CdBaby

“In early 2001-2002 my band was signed to a label and we were trying to figure out our distribution plans. That was the first time I had heard of CDBaby as we were also based in Portland. Our label tells us something along the lines of ‘Hey CDBaby is in Portland, why don’t you get a meeting and see what you can find out about distribution. So I did and walked out of there with a job!”

“I started in the warehouse in 2002. We had just signed a deal with iTunes before anyone knew what that was. We had to digitize all the albums and turn them into mp3s and all that jazz. However, as a touring musician I started to improve my knowledge of what an indie artist needs and how to talk to them so I was moved to customer service because at the end of the day I knew how to address artists issues because they cared about the same issues I cared about!”

That was just the beginning of a professional journey that took Joel straight to the president’s office, where he walks into every day now.

“It feels very good to have substantive rewards for my work, as part of a positive feedback loop. It gets hard to be creative in a hermit-like vacuum—especially during a pandemic, when live performance is not an option,” explains ambient/electronic artist Robert Rich, who’s been working with CD Baby since 2004. “Seeing some income is a reminder that people do actually listen and care about the music.” 

“We are leaving heavily towards education this year! We are taking our blog, podcast and conference to the next level as we truly believe that the more an artist is successful the more we will be successful and success is achieved through education, especially in this industry!”