Sean Michaels went out the door with 1400 pieces on Rocks That Ass, his first release for his own company, Sean Michaels Productions.
Michaels: This is the first week after my first week in business. It started out a little scary. Other distributors try to beat you up when you distribute your own product. They don't want new vendors. Thank God we're in the position where there is a demand. We went out with 1400 the first week, and I'm happy with that. Being new, a lot of people don't even do that and I know that for a fact. I also have inside information on a few companies when they first started out, their first week, their first month. God willing, we're going to be just fine. We're not going to let people kick us around. We know we have a quality tape, and we put a lot of money and time and effort into it. We're not just going to let it go out of here at the going rate that some companies sell for just to move tape. We've worked with some of the distributors out there on our pricing so they could take more numbers. That's just simple economics. But for people who are buying small amounts of a number, they have to pay full price. Somebody will buy it. What we may lack in numbers out the door, we can recoup on the back end on re-orders not only through the conventional means of distribution but through the Internet as well."
Michaels says he hasn't taken any personal flack about the boxcover, though some second-guess comments have been voiced about Michaels' choice of black.
Michaels: "You know everybody's watching. I'm sure I would have heard something by now. We send out screeners. A lot of our stuff hit last week. Today was our street date but a lot of people received their goods Saturday. Actually some people were buying tape yesterday, and we got a lot of re-orders. I think if we were going to hear any flack about the box, we would have by now. I'm, not saying that this still can't come down the road, but you're not going to be able to please everybody. You just have to stick to your guns and what you believe in. Who knows? Maybe someday. someone will be copying my style?"
