Q&A: Epitaph’s Dave Jiannis on his new merch company, Artist First
Dave Jiannis of Epitaph Australia has teamed with Sydney-based merchandise and design company Love Police ATM and music industry collective the Staple Group to launch online music merchandise company Artist First.
Launched today, Artist First Pty Ltd stemmed from Jiannis’ long-standing relationship with US merch company Kings Road. Jiannis, who has been with Epitaph Australia for over ten years and is now Label Manager, has agreements with Epitaph, Epitaph’s sister label ANTI- and Chopped Rod & Custom festival.
Artist First's fulfillment partners areLove Police, which has 18 years experience in band and events merch, and Staple Group, which has touring and events company Destroy All Lines, Brisbane venue The Brightside, youth lifestyle company The Witching Hour,and music news website Killyourstereo.com.
Artist First’s relationship with Kings Road Merch sees them represent artists such as Bad Religion, Tom Waits, Beastie Boys, Descendents, Dropkick Murphys, Ghost and local band Parkway Drive.
Caz Worsley, previously Head of Marketing at Shock Entertainment, and recently Consumer Marketing Manager at Converse Australia, will be running the day-to-day operations for Artist First.
TMN asked Jiannis a few questions about how Artist First differs from other online merch stores, its label partner agreements and the ethos behind the model.
How does your relationship with Kings Road Merch come into play with Artist First?
I have been dealing with Kings Road Merch since its inception and I have admired the way they operate. It’s something I wanted to replicate locally here in Australia, that’s how the idea of Artist First came about. When the opportunity came about to represent Kings Road Merch and their artists locally I was excited, humbled and honoured to do so.
Epitaph is a label partner with Unified’s merch store 24 Hundred, what kind of agreements do you have for your record labelpartners?
Epitaph isn’t a label partner with 24Hundred per se. 24Hundred did have the rights to the Kings Road Merch catalogue, which has now come over to Artist First. Our agreements with other record label partners are flexible. We have the option to offer a variety of deals that suit the partner best.
What’s the ethos behind Artist First, how will it benefit artists more so than the current local merch companies?
It’s an artist first model, everything is branded towards the band/artist, as that’s the way we feel it should be. It’s their music, their designs, their merchandise it should be all about them. We work in helping get your brand (music/merchandise) out to your fans, offering a dedicated online branded store. Our model is for bands that want their own store rather than being in a store alongside many other bands. We differ from sites like bandcamp in that we offer a full service including all the shipping, customer service, web design and digital marketing.
What percentage profit do you make from band merchandise?
This really depends on the type of deal we do with an artist or band.
You’re also offering artists help with marketing and design, is this common in the merchandise business?
We have the opportunity to offer digital marketing assistance due to Caz’s extensive knowledge and e-commerce experience being the head of marketing at Shock Records and consumer marketing manager at Converse. Since we are focused on selling online, we aim to work with our artists to make sure the fans know when new merch is available, so social media, email & digital marketing will be crucial to get the word out and see good sell through. Pre-orders are a big part of what we do as well, where we tie in new merch with album releases. It's all about working with the artists and adding value wherever we can.