Alison Wenham

President - WIN (UK)


Alison has spent over 25 years working in the music industry, and is one of the most experienced and well known practitioners in the business. She has worked in both the independent and the multinational sectors, gaining comprehensive experience of the advantages and disadvantages of independent versus multinational infrastructures, while developing a thorough knowledge of all aspects of the industry.

She has been Chairman and CEO of AIM since it was formed in 1998, and has guided it through growth in membership – which is now around 900 – and influence. AIM members represent around 20% of the UK market and worth approximately £650m (approaching the £673m1 value of the entire British film industry), and independents are the acknowledged creative backbone of the industry, developing new trends, new artists and adopting new technologies ahead of the multinationals.

Prior to AIM Alison was MD of BMG Conifer, controlling revenues of around £20m within BMG Entertainment International, into which she had brought Conifer Records (which under her direction had grown to be the largest independent record and distribution company in the specialist music field).

In 2006 Alison was elected as founding President of WIN (Worldwide Independent Network comprising over 20 independent trade associations representing thousands of independent music companies globally). She has also been Vice President of IMPALA (the European organisation representing the interests of small record companies and publishers in Europe) and is Chair of the Small Business Group and Co-Chair of the Business Focus Group of the MBF (Music Business Forum), a fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts, Special Music Adviser to the British Council, attends PPL and VPL Board meetings and sits on a variety of government and industry committees.