Three entrepreneurs have opened the newest record press in the United States — and it's just outside Portland.
The company says it's producing "high quality records for discerning artists and labels" in batches as small as 500 records.
Cascade Record Pressing
The founders of the start-up Cascade Record Pressing are all huge music fans with a big interest in vinyl. The music industry's demand for vinyl pressings has exploded over the past few years. But the infrastructure to make new record pressing machines was mothballed decades ago, when LPs took a back seat to cassettes and then, CDs. Vinyl records are now selling by the millions again.
Big record companies like Sony and Warner Brothers have returned to the vinyl game, swamping a limited circle of record-pressing plants with large orders.
After months of finding presses, parts and staff to maintain them, Adam Gonsalves, Mark Rainey and Steve Lanning have started taking orders at an industrial park in Milwaukie, Oregon.
They say they want to supply small- to mid-sized record labels. Those companies have seen their orders sidelined as the giants have re-entered the market.
Its owners believe it's the first record press in the Northwest since Seattle's Morrison Records stopped production.