Pinnacle and Windsong went into administration this week, which will have a profound effect on physical distribution of CDs in the UK. As well as distributing some labels direct, Pinnacle also acted as a fulfilment house and national accounts sales for other smaller specialist independent distributors.

It would seem that a number of the larger labels had an inkling that Pinnacle were potentially in trouble, as they had already laid plans to leave Pinnacle in 2009. New Note and Proper have brought forward their distribution agreement and Cooking Vinyl's Essential operation has now established an active sales division with distribution via Cinram.

So, I wondered who is still doing distribution for independent labels. Fortunately, there are still a number of different distribution channels. Some completely independent and others using what appear to be arms of the majors (Cinram and Arvato). However, as most of these distributors will have sold stock to EUK, there may be more failures in the next couple of months (according to how that administration works out). Where I have been able to ascertain links, I've noted these below. This list is not intended to be exhaustive and is largely reliant on information on the companies own websites.

Some distributors of 'independent music'
Absolute - http://www.absolutemarketing.co.uk/ - uses Universal
ADA - http://www.ada-music.com/faq.php - email contact only, owned by Warners, uses Cinram
Cadiz - http://www.cadizmusic.co.uk/intro.htm - was using Pinnacle exclusively in the UK
Cargo - http://www.cargorecords.co.uk/contact
Essential - http://www.essential-music.com/distribution.html - has now moved from Pinnacle to Cinram for fulfilment
Kudos Records - http://www.kudosrecords.co.uk/index.php?page=info - were using Pinnacle for fulfilment and national account sales
PIAS UK (previously VITAL) - http://www.pias.com/uk/
Plastichead - http://www.plastichead.com/about.asp
Proper - http://www.properdistribution.com/index.php
Republic of Music - http://www.republicofmusic.net/#/about/
Right Track Distribution - http://www.righttrackdistribution.co.uk/index.html - uses Universal (so presumably now goes through arvato)
RSK - http://www.rskentertainment.co.uk/about.ihtml - appears to use Arvato for fulfilment
Shellshock - http://www.shellshock.co.uk/contacts.php - were using Pinnacle for part fulfilment
SRD (Southern Record Distributors) - http://www.srd.co.uk/

Large operations which also carry major label catalogue
Arvato - http://www.arvatoentertainment.co.uk/ - used by BMG, Universal, RSK and possibly Right Track
Cinram - http://www.theentertainmentnetwork.co.uk/aboutus.asp - used by Warners, ADA and Essential

Let me know of any other CD distributors, I may have missed. Thanks