Signs of spending time browsing physical music coming to an end became imminently real last month as the nation’s favourite entertainment retailer HMV stumbled into administration.

First Game fell and then Blockbuster followed shortly after as the high street saw its worst December sales for 15 years. Add this to the closure of Jessops – that makes three high street retailers to enter administration in the first four weeks of 2013.

So where has it all gone wrong for HMV? Is it simply down to illegal downloading, online stores offering the same products at cheaper prices or something deeper such as poor business management6?

Failure to modernise to suit the customer’s needs partnered with the fact HMV continued to sell gift vouchers in December (now deemed void) after investors warned they would face a solvency crisis by the end of January if they didn’t change has seen the public opinion pendulum swing sharply against HMV. It’s easy to comment in the aftermath of a situation, but the tactical gamble taken to virtually ignore the birth of the digital age has royally shot HMV in the foot – leaving them grovelling for funding from suppliers to the tune of £300million, according to the Financial Times.

At a time where I can access ANY released track by ANY artist at a click of a button on my laptop, how backwards is it that the nation’s favourite music retailer can only offer a handful of songs over their PA? It’ll take a lot more than fiddling with a few tablets and an assortment of over-ear headphones to try out to save the future of 2008’s ‘Entertainment Retailer of the Year.’

My two cents (for what it’s worth) would be to implement an interactive purchasing system. The main reason digital downloading and illegal file sharing has become so popular in the music industry is the ease, the speed and the ‘try before you purchase’ system.

‘But what about price?! It’s always about price!’ I hear you cry.

Surprisingly, the price of our personal music use bears very little to how we consume it. The Rolling Stones offered a 50th anniversary tour – their tickets priced at hundreds of pounds were eagerly snapped up by fans. Illegal downloading web searches are at an all-time high – more than 2.7 million performed in 2011 alone. Yet, shy of hiring the band to perform in your back garden, listening to music through vinyl is the most expensive method available. Purchasing an LP can easily set you back £10-20, yet sales are at a seven-year-strong trend as the graph below shows:

An interactive system, if worked out correctly, could see a rebirth in all physical music sales. Working together with a music streaming software company like Spotify, the customer could listen to an album or a track and decide whether they wish to purchase it.

In a world where I can access any piece of information in the world with the small piece of technology I carry in my pocket, it seems unfathomable HMV still relies on their customers to buy ain album purely on how it looks on their shelves. It’s an expensive risk which the modern consumer has made clear they won’t take anymore, and HMV have refused to listen.

The idea comes from a new idea by Tesco introduced in South Korea (skip to 50 seconds) :

Obviously Spotify requires an internet connection. Therefore, the in-store system would require something similar. This could create a personal order set-up for the customer. Think Argos in terms of having to do your own stock check before purchase – the system could tell you whether the album is in stock, then give you the option to order it straight to your doorstep if unavailable to purchase in store.

Currently, the future of HMV remains unclear as the ‘blue-cross’ sale is still going strong but their website offers little additional information:

A buy-out may not even be enough to save the store, as the tabloids report previous owner of collapsed Comet, Henry Jackson and equally troubled Game the only interested parties.

But one thing does remain clear; If HMV does go under then as much as the music industry would like to argue – the blame would lie solely with them. As much as I would like their future to be safeguarded, the future looks shaky for physical music.