The following numbers were derived from SoundScan, as reported by Billboard, Digital Music News, The Los Angeles Times, and Bloomberg.

For the 52 weeks ending January 2, 2011, Overall Albums sold (Physical -- CDs, LPs, and Cassettes -- plus Downloads) amounted to 326.2 million units -- down 12.7 percent from 2009. This continuing trend has me very worried since downloads have come nowhere near to replacing sales of manufactured goods.

There were 240 million Physical Albums sold (LPs, Cassettes and CDs -- which themselves were about 99 percent of the total) -- down 19 percent.

Digital Album downloads were up 13 percent to 86.3 million, and represented about 26.5 percent of all albums sold, but as I wrote above, hardly sufficient to offset the decline of CDs.

Sales of digital tracks were up a mere 1 percent to a total of 1,172 billion.

The only positive was a 14 percent increase in sales of Vinyl to a total of 2.8 million LPs. But let's take a closer look at what was sold. The seven top titles were The Beatles "Abbey Road" at 35,000 units; Arcade Fire's "The Suburbs" at 18,800; The Black Keys "Brothers" at 18,400; Vampire Weekend's "Contra" at 15,000; Michael Jackson's "Thriller" at 14,200; The National's "High Violet" at 13,600; and Beach House's "Teen Dream" at 13,000. These are hardly "stellar" numbers.

All Digital formats combined represented 46 percent of total music purchases last year. This is an increase of 40 percent over 2009. Digital albums represented 26 percent of all albums sold, an increase of 20 percent over 2009.

Five tracks sold over 4 million units, with another seven selling more than 3 million. Whereas in 2009 89 songs sold more than 1 million units, only 86 sold that many in 2010.

The decline in total sales has much to do with an increase in peer-to-peer downloading ("piracy" to be blunt!) and shrinking shelf-space at fewer brick & mortar retailers.

While in previous years "catalog" albums outsold "current" albums, 2010 showed a decline in catalog sales, thereby putting a wrench in the "Long Tail" theory.

Not much of a surprise, but Universal Music had the largest share of market at 31.4 percent, followed by Sony Music at 27.4, Warner Music at 19.8, Indies as a group at 11.6, and a still-struggling EMI at 9.6 percent.

One third of all music sales (real and virtual) were at big-box stores such as Wal-Mart and Target, while only 8 percent were at independent retailers. Interestingly, a whopping 71 percent of vinyl was sold at indies.

As for Digital sales, Apple's iTunes had more than 60 percent of the market, while Amazon.com's was a distant second.

So what does this decline of sales mean to owners and managers of small independent record companies?

It means they have to be very careful and astute when making decisions about spending their limited funds. It might mean releasing fewer titles and focusing their efforts on artists who've proven themselves in the past, or who are starting to create audiences and fans by performing frequently in front of paying customers.

It means establishing well thought-through recording and marketing budgets, and following them closely, spending money where and when essential, but not chasing elusive sales.

It means looking closely at your staff to see if all are making contributions to the business and are proving to be worth their salaries.