NAICS 512240Canadian industry · 6-digitnational market

Sound recording studios

This Canadian industry comprises establishments primarily engaged in providing the facilities and technical expertise for sound recording in a studio, and audio production and post-production services for film, television and video. These establishments do not hold the copyrights to the sound recordings produced in their facilities. — Statistics Canada, NAICS 2022A

Establishments · CanadaA
153
with employees
Under 10 employeesA
90%
most common size: 1–4
Establishments · USA
2,117
Employment · USA
6,321
3.0 per establishment
Payroll · USA
$469M
$74k per employee
01

Size and shape

How many businesses there are and how small they are. Fragmentation is the first thing an entrant — or anyone selling software into this industry — needs to know, and it is one of the few things that is actually measured.

Canadian establishments by number of employeesA

1–411273%
5–92617%
10–19128%
20–4932%
50–990—
100–1990—
200–4990—
500+0—

Of 153 Canadian establishments with employees, 90% have fewer than ten — an industry of very small operators.

Where they areA

Ontario6140%
British Columbia3825%
Quebec3322%
Alberta149%

Largest four provinces by establishment count. Establishments with employees only — sole operators with no payroll are not in this table, so in trades and personal services the true number of businesses is higher.

How many new establishments are still tradingA
Information, US · opened 2020
79.6%
1 year
59%
3 years
45.7%
5 years
30%
10 years
opened 2015

Measured, not forecast: the share of US establishments opening in one year that were still active later. It counts good operators and bad ones together, which is exactly why it is the honest answer to “what are the odds”. It is for the whole sector rather than this market, and the ten-year figure comes from an older cohort because no younger one has reached ten years.

02

How businesses here compete

The structural profile of subsector 512, which every industry beneath it inherits. This is analyst judgment from how the subsector is organised — not research into this industry, and not a measurement.

national competitionmedium capitalUNVERIFIEDinherited from 512 Motion picture and sound recording industries

Project-financed work dependent on commissioners and tax credits. Service production follows the exchange rate and the incentives.

Who sets the price
Broadcasters, streamers and tax-credit regimes.
The software it runs on
Production management, post-production pipelines, rights and royalties.
03

Market screens and studies

Market-entry records filed along this branch of the hierarchy. A record at or beneath this code is about this industry; one above it is about something wider that contains it.

Screened one level up. Nothing is filed at this exact code; the screen for 5122 Sound recording industries covers it.

04

Software serving this industry

The vertical software markets filed along the same branch — who sells to these businesses and who they would have to displace — and then the generic categories every business buys whatever it does.

Sold across the wider branch

05

Who works here

The occupations employed in Information and cultural industries, most concentrated in it first. The share is measured against the whole sector, not this industry — the published cross-tabulation stops there.

Concentrated in this sectorA

These jobs are mostly done here. An operator in this industry is competing for them against others in the same industry, not against the whole economy.

And the jobs every business has

Found across at least fourteen of the twenty sectors. But note the shape of this industry: 90% of establishments have fewer than ten employees, and at that size most of these roles are one person wearing several hats, or bought in from outside.

All 162 occupations →