CSPC: Barbra Streisand Popularity Analysis

Original Album Sales – Comments

1963 The Barbra Streisand Album – 1,080,000
1963 The Second Barbra Streisand Album – 1,130,000
1964 The Third Album – 1,070,000
1964 People – 1,260,000
1965 My Name Is Barbra – 1,130,000
1965 My Name Is Barbra, Two… – 1,470,000
1966 Color Me Barbra – 860,000
1966 Je m’appelle Barbra – 780,000
1967 Simply Streisand – 640,000
1967 A Christmas Album – 6,580,000
1968 Funny Girl (Soundtrack) – 2,960,000
1969 What About Today? – 430,000
1969 Hello, Dolly! – 760,000
1970 On a Clear Day You Can See Forever – 260,000
1970 The Owl and the Pussycat – 120,000
1971 Stoney End – 1,380,000
1971 Barbra Joan Streisand – 1,120,000
1971 Barbra Streisand…and Other Musical Instruments – 330,000
1974 The Way We Were – 3,260,000
1974 The Way We Were: Original Soundtrack Recording – 770,000
1974 ButterFly – 1,240,000
1975 Funny Lady – 1,260,000
1975 Lazy Afternoon – 940,000
1976 Classical Barbra – 730,000
1976 A Star Is Born – 8,190,000
1977 Superman – 2,720,000
1978 Songbird – 1,790,000
1979 The Main Event – 840,000
1979 Wet – 2,770,000
1980 Guilty – 13,140,000
1983 Yentl – 3,500,000
1984 Emotion – 1,960,000
1985 The Broadway Album – 5,350,000
1988 Till I Loved You – 2,550,000
1993 Back to Broadway – 2,850,000
1996 The Mirror Has Two Faces – 1,490,000
1997 Higher Ground – 5,090,000
1999 A Love Like Ours – 1,750,000
2001 Christmas Memories – 1,370,000
2003 The Movie Album – 1,150,000
2005 Guilty Pleasures – 1,460,000
2009 Love Is the Answer – 950,000
2011 What Matters Most – 370,000
2016 Encore: Movie Partners Sing Broadway – 520,000

Streisand sold 91,37 million units of her studio albums over the curse of her career. She started very strong, selling a million with all her LPs during a singles-axed era.

She had difficult years in 1969-1970, but she quickly recovered and then remained relevant ever since. Expectedly, Guilty emerges as the top seller with more than 13 million units sold. A Star Is Born, A Christmas Album, The Broadway Album and Higher Ground are all over 5 million units.

A few more albums perform better than average. They include Soundtracks like Funny Girl, The Way We Were but also the likes Superman, Wet and Back to Broadway.

As for flops, there is hardly any. Out of 44 albums, only 4 sold under half a million units which in itself is incredible considering how extensive Streisand‘s catalog is.

One may say her sales aren’t that much global. It is true that the US is far and away her biggest market, accounting for 61,4 million of these sales, some 67% of the total. It is the way the industry was though, the same was true for most artists. Her debut album wasn’t even released in Asia, in Latin America or in continental Europe so obviously the US were going to represent the largest share of its sales! Once overseas markets started to be developed in mid-70s, Streisand did very well there. Guilty is the prime example since it sold only 43% of its units in the US.