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A growing record
collection

PPL

Project

AGM & Annual Review
Concept, Design & Data Visualisation

The brief

Visualise a year of record
growth in music licensing

In 2014 PPL collected a record-breaking revenue for its performer and recording rightsholder members. They wanted their Annual Review to celebrate this success and show their importance to the music industry.

Our Solution

We cut a record and got
creative with the numbers

Previous annual reviews had been criticised for being too corporate and lacking the creativity of the members PPL so successfully represent.

We knew music needed to be at the heart of the design and we wanted to make it tactilely appealing. With 2014 seeing a huge increase in vinyl sales, record sleeves were the natural inspiration. For many of the review’s target audience - performers, record company executives, journalists - sliding a record out of its sleeve will forever trigger anticipation and excitement. So, an annual review presented in a similar fashion was bound to pique their interest.

Referencing track listings and sleeve notes was pretty easy. The challenge was to hero the record growth statistics in a way that echoed the art of record covers. Our solution was an infographic based on the circular grooves of vinyl records. This device became the focus of the front cover and ran throughout the review. When the visuals were combined with a die-cut sleeve the annual review changed from being a legal necessity to a reinforcement of PPL’s passion for music.

£161.2m