Inside the pressing plant

The records that fans line up for on Record Store Day are being made in a 60,000-square-foot factory in Toronto, where Microforum handles vinyl, compact discs, printing and packaging under one roof. (goldminemag.com) Goldmine’s April 11, 2026 tour said Microforum Service Group is a full-service plant and identified Noble Musa as the executive walking through the operation ahead of Record Store Day on April 18, 2026. (goldminemag.com) (recordstoreday.com) Microforum says it does the key steps of record manufacturing in-house, including mastering, lacquer cutting, electroplating, pressing and print packaging. The company says that setup lets it move projects from audio file to finished jacket without sending parts to outside vendors. (microforum.ca) A vinyl record starts as a master disc, then metal parts are made from that master, and those metal stampers press grooves into heated plastic. Microforum says its plant uses Viryl WarmTone presses and pairs them with in-house plating and packaging. (microforum.ca) (thevinylfactory.com) That factory scale matters because Record Store Day runs on scarcity: one-day releases, fixed allotments and independent stores that need stock to arrive on time. Record Store Day says the event began in 2007, launched its first celebration on April 19, 2008, and now involves nearly 1,400 independently owned stores in the United States plus thousands more internationally. (recordstoreday.com) The demand behind those releases is still large. The Recording Industry Association of America said vinyl revenue in the United States rose 7 percent to $1.4 billion in 2024, the 18th straight annual increase, and vinyl albums outsold compact discs for the third year in a row, 44 million units to 33 million. (riaa.com) Microforum’s integrated model is also a response to a bottleneck that has followed vinyl’s comeback for years: too few presses, too many special editions, and packaging that can slow a job even after the discs are made. Microforum says having printing and custom packaging on-site shortens turnaround and gives it more control over rush orders. (vinyl-pressing-plants.com) (microforum-bespoke.ca) The company has been building toward that role for nearly a decade. In 2016, Microforum said it signed to install Viryl pressing lines in Toronto, and a 2017 industry report said the company planned six automated lines with output of up to 24,000 records a day. (newswire.ca) (canadianmanufacturing.com) By the time collectors hit stores on April 18, most of the drama will happen in public: lines, sold-out titles and flipping through bins before noon. The quieter part of the story is the factory work that turns a limited release into an object stores can actually put on the shelf. (recordstoreday.com) (goldminemag.com)