Over the last 20 months, as Adele’s album “21” spent week after week in the Top 10 — a total of 79 weeks in the United States, with 24 of them at No. 1 — envious record executives have, between salivations, wondered what kind of profit all those sales would bring.
That number has now been revealed: nearly $67 million, according to recently filed accounts by Adele’s label, XL Recordings. And that’s just for last year. (Nor does that number include Adele’s songwriting royalties or concert fees, in which neither XL nor its parent company, Beggars Group, has any interest.)
XL had $181 million in revenue in 2011, up about 400 percent from the $36 million it reported the year before. The label had $66.9 million in operating profit, before taxes, and ended the year with just less than $60 million in cash.
“We’ve sold 25 million copies of ’21’ around the world,” Martin Mills, the chairman of Beggars Group, said in a telephone interview on Monday. “And when you sell that many records
everyone makes money. Not just Adele and the label, but distributors, retail, everyone.”
XL had nine releases in 2011, including albums by the Horrors, Friendly Fires and Tyler, the Creator. But of course “21” — the top seller around the world, with more than 18 million in total sales by the end of last year — was the label’s rainmaker. (By comparison, 4AD, which like XL is half-owned by Beggars Group, had about $15 million
in revenue and eight new releases.)
For its success, XL paid $27.3 million in dividends, half of which went to Richard Russell, one of its founders, and the other half to Beggars. In its own accounts, filed with British regulators, Beggars — which in addition to XL and 4AD has full or part ownership of Rough Trade, Matador and other labels — reported $138 million in revenue for the year and $37 million in operating profit.
Mr. Mills said Beggars’ share of the XL dividend would go “to invest in our future.” The companies’ finances were reported by The Sunday Times of London.
Adele, whose real name is Adele Adkins, has a contract with XL that gives the label worldwide rights to release her recordings. But in the United States and throughout Central and South America it licenses her music to Columbia Records, which XL executives have said is better equipped to handle radio promotion and marketing on a large scale.
The success of “21” has continued into 2012, with four million in sales since the beginning of the year in the United States alone. That brings its total here to about 125,000 shy of 10 million — a gap that, at the album’s current sales rate, Adele will very likely close by the end of the year. This month she released “Skyfall,” the theme to the new James Bond movie, and the song currently stands at No. 2 on iTunes’ ranking in the United States.
Even so, XL’s report includes a note of caution about future earnings.
“The next Adele album may not come for some years, and it’s impossible to predict its likely sales,” the company said. “We therefore regard this year’s figures as exceptional.”