DVD, Blu-ray sales strong despite down economy
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Data from DVD and Blu-ray Disc sales and rentals shows the home video business is holding up well despite the down economy, the high price of gas and any consumer shift toward the Internet.
Consumer spending on DVDs and Blu-ray in the first six months of the year, purchases and rentals combined, was up 1.6% from spending in first-half 2007, according to Home Media Magazine’s market research department. The first-half 2008 tally: $10.77 billion, compared with $10.6 billion a year ago.
Spending on disc purchases rose 1.1%, from $6.8 billion to $6.87 billion. Rental spending rose 2.6% from $3.8 billion in the first six months of last year to $3.9 billion, according to Home Media Magazine market research calculations.
Unit sales were up a healthy 1.1% as well, with consumers buying an estimated 412.3 million discs in the first six months of the year, up from 407.9 million discs in first-half 2007, according to studio reports.
Home entertainment industry analyst Tom Adams isn’t surprised about the continued health of the packaged media business, despite Wall Street’s negative perceptions.
“Most analysts are techno-geeks with plenty of money and not much time, while most Americans are not technically savvy, and they have plenty of time but not much money,” said Adams, president of Adams Media Research. “The fact is, despite what many on Wall Street seem to think, there is very little digital downloading going on. We’re talking about $118 million in 2007 spending, and about $254 million this year — so against a $24 billion packaged media market it’s really not making much of a dent at this point.”