I am helping a friend produce home made CDs.

No matter what you multiply a minimum order of 1000 by, it becomes a large chunk of change for an artist with a very small or nonexistent budget to produce up front.

Even if the total final cost or producing the CDs at home exceeds the cost of having the CDs reproduced commercially by a fair margin, paying those costs in small installments over a period of time might be the only way the artist can handle the finances.

And then there are 1000 CDs to deal with.

Modern recording technology has two benefits that are sometimes confused. It makes it possible for amateurs to do things that previously only professionals could do. It makes it affordable for amateurs to do things affordably that previously only professionals could do.