Ton Vermeulen is the proud owner of Record Industry, together with his wife Mieke. Before he took over the Haarlem-based pressing plant in 1998 he already knew the music industry inside out. He was a deejay, worked for radio stations and music distributors and co-owned a very successful dance label.

'I bought my first singles in the early 70's. Every now and then my parents would give me a little money, which I was allowed to spend at a local record store. I bought the singles of the bands that were very popular at the time, The Sweet, Middle Of The Road, The Poppies and others. Around that time I hung out with two of my nephews, Marko and Peter Sloothaak. They were also into music, big time. The first one was a major fan of The Beatles. Peter, the oldest, collected 7”es. Every 30^th of April - Queen's day in Holland - we would roam the free markets on streets of Amsterdam, looking for singles. They were very cheap, so we came home with hundreds, sometimes thousands of them. We would clean them with some water and soap and then enjoy the music.'  

We strongly advise our customers to design their label artwork in CMYK. Why? After printing, the labels will be exposed to high temperatures (180 degrees Celsius) to dry them. Any moisture left in the paper can cause imperfections. We therefore bake them in a special label oven for almost an hour and a half. After that they are pressed onto the record, using the same high temperature of approximately 180 degrees. Some pantone colours tend to change colour during this process, especially colours with a high white percentage (> 50 %) and metallic colours. Another good reason to supply your label artwork in CMYK: it's a lot cheaper than printing in pantones.

How do you like our 'wall of sound'? We love decorating our walls with sleeves and records pressed @ Record Industry. This huge frame is made of a wooden plate and a bunch of steel U profiles. Which titles do you recognize?