Notably, with over 1 million items from 35,000 artists, Merchbar is one of the largest music merchandise shops in the worldwide. The exciting partnership will provide artists with Official Artist Channels to post their merch. Once live, the merch will be shared on a virtual shelf. This shelf will live below artists video descriptions on YouTube. Furthermore, fans who wish to purchase merchandise from an artist can then do so by clicking through to Merchbar’s website.

YouTube for Artists made a statement regarding the new partnership:

“Artists with an Official Artist Channel can now surface their official merchandise and vinyl alongside their videos. This collaboration is another way YouTube is working with artists to become their most valuable platform, providing a single place to share their music, promote upcoming tour dates and showcase their own official merchandise to a global audience.”

Perhaps the move to add Merchbar comes as YouTube is investing more in its music service. By defaulting YouTube Music as the default Android app, YouTube is clearly trying to make YouTube Music as sustainable as possible. When competing with powerhouses such as Spotify and Apple Music, it makes sense.

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YouTube Premium launched to the public just last May, but executives aren’t satisfied with how it’s performing. Unfortunately, not enough people are thinking it’s worth it to pay $12 a month for another subscription service. This new offering is likely a result of that.

The service is great because you can watch videos offline, along with original content from their favorite creators, all ad free. YouTube original shows like Cobra Kai and Liza on Demand have even grown popular and are expecting new seasons. Still, the company is unable to compete with the likes of HBO and Netflix. Now, YouTube has confirmed it will stream all of its original shows for free. The shows will be free to watch – just prepared for ads during your viewing experience.

“While every other media company is building a paywall, we’re headed in the opposite direction and now have more opportunities than ever to partner with advertisers and share our critically- acclaimed originals with our global audience.”

It’s unclear how long this opportunity will last, but it’s believed to be temporary. If it fails, it might be the end of the premium service for good. All in all, YouTube believes that with the amount of YouTube users already, they will be able to make more profits with this strategy. Susa Wojcicki, YouTube’s CEO, further explained how the company has “more opportunities than ever to partner with advertisers…” In a day where advertisements are nearly impossible to avoid, YouTube’s future will heavily depend on them to survive.

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According to an article by Bloomberg, music executives have been disappointed with meager revenue from YouTube Red. Instead of being a service dedicated to music, the paid streaming service by YouTube has been focused mainly on original video content. Standard YouTube attracts over a billion views every month, and the majority of the content digested is music. Warner Music Group has already signed on to be part of the new project, with negotiations still underway with Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group and Merlin. Lyor Cohen, formerly of Warner Music Group, has been acting as a liaison to the industry and overseeing the project.

The project, dubbed ‘Remix’ internally, will combine the aspects of streaming and videos that are offered by Google Play Music and YouTube, for a more unique user experience. Vevo, which releases music videos on YouTube is also in talks with the ‘Remix’ team. The Google Play service will disappear as a result of this launch.

Spotify and Apple Music have been responsible for a recent return to form for the music industry, accounting for 51% of all music sales. Not one to be left out of the ring for long, Google obviously wants to start taking a bite out of this pie. It is unlike Google to be bad at something, but with enough resources it should be pleasing label executives in no time. With competition coming from unlikely sources such as crypto services like Choon and GRMTK, it’s exciting times in the rebirth of the music industry.

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