By today's standards, that sounds impossible. Either way, lack of sales spelled trouble. First, large record outlets began gobbling up many of the individual record stores. Soon these big outlets wanted to control their information and it became harder for programmers to obtain sales stats from individual stores. The outlets began supplying radio stations with total sales for the market, but this made it impossible for programmers to follow ethnic or diversified sales from a given area.
Stations are specific their target demos.
As sales showed only the large melting pot, specific sales breakouts were impossible to identify. Next came the diminished impact of singles sales. In many cases, the surviving local record stores found it difficult to get immediate product. The tail began wagging the dog. Bring on SoundScan, K-Mart and WalMart and record sales have become less of a programming tool.