As someone who use to do the CD buying for a local folk music store, I can state with confidence that local musician CDs don't sell unless the musician is already quite well-known locally and is playing LOTS of gigs to stay that way. I'm talking about the top 5% or so of musicians who put out CDs. The store I worked at had a policy of supporting local musicians by carrying their CDs and, for years, we always bought a few. We usually had a "Local Music" section as well as putting them in whatever section they belonged in.

These days, no CDs are selling and stores are getting out of the business. But even before that happened, local CDs, for the most part, represented money down the drain and dead shelf space. We tried the consignment route, but that actually cost more than buying them outright -- we had to keep track of them, and that takes time, especially since a majority of the local musicians are inept at running their businesses.