NPD: Blu-ray Disc Player Sales Up 3% on Black Friday

11 Dec, 2013 By: Erik Gruenwedel

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For the first time in three years, U.S. consumer electronics sales, both online and in retail stores, increased double digits during Black Friday week

Consumer electronics sales increased 10% to nearly $5 billion the week of Black Friday (Nov. 24-30).  TVs, tablets, and notebooks accounted for $3.1 billion of the overall revenue, as streaming media players (Roku, Apple TV, etc.) ranked among the top five sellers, according to new data from The NPD Group.

Blu-ray Disc players — a mainstay in Black Friday promotions — saw a slight sales increase. Despite significant promotions (i.e. Walmart’s $38 special price), BD player sales increased just 3% compared to a 20% increase in 2012. Average selling prices fell from $56 in 2012 to $51 this year, and as a result, revenue was down about $4 million.   

Meanwhile, there were significant contributions from some of the newer product categories, including streaming speakers (sales up 154%), streaming media players such as Roku and Apple TV (up 91%), sound bars (up 86%), headphones (up 70%) and camcorders (up 59%).  Two-thirds of all the categories with more than $30 million in sales revenue grew over last year.

Stephen Baker, VP of industry analysis, NPD, said revenue growth across all the major large categories and accelerating revenue increases in the fastest growing mid-size categories, combined with a slowing in revenue declines in some of the legacy categories, meant that Black Friday week sales delivered an impressive start to the holiday season.

Similar to last year's results, TVs were the largest revenue generator with more than $1.4 billion in sales, up 5.6% over last year. Unit volumes soared nearly 16% to more than 4.7 million units, due in part to record low average selling prices (ASPs) on smaller screen TVs.

Sales of 32-inch TVs grew 40% from Black Friday week in 2012, while ASPs declined from $194 to $137 this year. Large screen TVs (60+ inches) were also flying off the shelves, with unit volumes increasing 62%. ASPs for these TVs have dropped significantly over the past few years from $1374 in 2011, to $1064 in 2012 down to $1005 in 2013.

Vizo, Samsung, and Sharp led the 60+-inch TV market with unit shares of 55%, 29% and 8%, respectively.
During Black Friday week, tablets were the second highest revenue generating category and unit volumes increased by 105%. Overall, PC and tablet sales increased by 58% to almost 5.9 million units. Notebooks unit volume fell 2%, while desktops experienced a 7% increase. 

Apple had a strong holiday week as it participated more aggressively in Black Friday sales promotions than ever before; sales were up 34% in notebooks, 51% in tablets and 277% in desktops.  Android-based tablets saw unit volumes climb 146%, and revenues jump 70%, although selling prices dropped from $151 to $105.

Seven-inch Android tablets, which accounted for 80% of all Android tablet sales, sold 1.8 million units with an ASP of $82. Windows devices grew 8% as the strong Surface promotion and the introduction of smaller Windows tablet sales offset the declines of 8% and 9% in desktops and notebooks, respectively.

“We are beginning to see emerging product categories contribute significantly to the overall market growth,” Baker said. “For example, headphones didn't break into 2010's top 50, but they were the fourth largest revenue category in 2013. The most significant sign of positive holiday momentum is that all of the top five categories delivered positive revenue in 2013.”

 

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