Car AV Sales Rise in April by 1%

share on:

UPDATE! The good folks at the NPD Group revised the total car audio numbers given us to uniformly exclude portable navigation and satellite radio accessories. So here’s the new year-to-date tally for car electronics (minus portable navi and satellite radio accessories): for April, car audio sales were up 1 percent and for Q1, they were down 10 percent in dollar sales to consumers. Car audio sales in this case include: car amplifiers, CD changers, cassette players, speakers, CD controllers, in-dash players, all multi-media (car video), in-dash navigation and satellite radio boxes. All the other numbers below are correct.

Original story:
The car AV/navigation market finally showed it has a pulse as April sales to consumers rose 1 [previously reported as 4] percent over April 2009 (in dollars). Car amplifiers and speakers were each up by 1 percent and in-dash navigation rose 2 percent. Car CD players (single) had a small drop of 3 percent.
This is welcome news as total car AV/navigation sales for the first quarter were down 10 [previously reported as 14] percent in dollars, according to the NPD Group.
The big drag on Q1 sales were car amplifiers and speakers, which fell 20 percent each in dollars. Head units saw minor Q1 declines: in-dash navigation fell 1 percent and in-dash single CD players dropped 5 percent in dollar sales to consumers.
Our take: sales year-to-date are not so bad for an industry that has been trending down for years, but somewhat disappointing considering it shouldn’t be too hard to beat last year’s sales by a wide margin given the recession in 2009.
Note: NPD’s total car AV/navigation sales to consumers exclude [previously reported as include] portable GPS and satellite radio “box accessories.”
–Amy Gilroy
Source: The NPD Group
Photo via braunhaus.org

Want to receive industry news? Sign up here
share on:

2 Comments

  1. Take a look at the advertising budget for Apple, or the HD TV market? Not only is the budget gigantic, but the message is easily understood. The message is clear; “This does something you want!”. Our industry has a minute budget and a fuzzy message at best, communicated poorly. Our consumer does not know why they should want what we offer. ANY increase is a pleasant surprise, but I would not count on any trends to that effect.

Comments are closed.