CD Baby is continuing to expand globally with hires in Canada, Latin America, East Asia/Pacific, and the UK and EU. CD Baby is also adding local Artist Support Centers around the world, starting with the UK in the coming months. These centers will give specific advice in local languages tailored to the needs of artists in those locales.
“CD Baby is committed to becoming a global leader and to serving independent artists around the world. We need to be present where the artists are, and to provide artists everywhere the ability to get support and access to our services the way our US artists do,” says Heli Del Moral, CD Baby’s VP for International Development. “We feel it is very important to be physically present in these regions. To this end, we are expanding our global team with industry professionals who believe deeply in our vision and share our passion for indie artists.”
New CD Baby Regional Hires
Henriette Heimdal will be joining CD Baby’s London office as Market Development Coordinator. Heimdal brings with her strong relationships across the European industry, having worked in recent years for trade association Worldwide Independent Network (WIN), representing the global independent sector.
Darryl Hurs is CD Baby’s new Canadian representative, based in Toronto. Hurs started Indie Week Canada almost two decades ago as a hobby, only to transform it into a flagship event for the independent music scene, with thousands of bands applying each year.
Johanna Rivera will join CD Baby representative Juan Peña in Colombia. Based in Bogota, her work will support artists from other South American and Spanish-speaking countries as well as Colombia, including parts of the Caribbean like the Dominican Republic. She worked for two years as Head of Customer Operations for a digital distribution company where she learned how to work with the artists to understand their goals and kickstart their careers.
Keith Tan has devoted years in Singapore to a wide range of music-related projects. Tan will be founding the first Asian office for CD Baby, a significant move into a increasingly important market.
“One of CD Baby’s true differentiators is that we are very focused on customer service. You should be able to pick up the phone and talk to a person, or get an email back promptly with an informed reply. We need people to answer in a local timezone who know the intricacies of the region and who can relate on a very local level,” reflects Del Moral. “We have built the team with this in mind, and the people who care most for artists will help us have our best business. We see this less as internationalisation, and more as regionalisation.”