Clarification: Car audio speaker sales to consumers could surpass sales of car radios in the next couple of years, said NPD Group analyst Ben Arnold. [Update: He refered to in-dash CD and radios only but not to in-dash navigation].
The gap between radio and speaker sales has been shrinking. In 2014, speaker sales totaled $232.9 million (for all types including subwoofers) and car radio sales were $266.7 million, by NPD calculations.
And while car speaker sales have generally been steady, car radio sales fell at a rate of 8 percent last year and 9 percent the year prior (2013 over 2012) in dollars.
Arnold agreed that speaker sales to consumers could be higher than in-dash radio sales in two years.
He told us, that by that time, “we could see their relative market sizes come to a point where demand on the speaker side makes that category larger in size that in-dash players.”
But he also noted that technology in the car is shifting, particularly with the advent of CarPlay and Android Auto. And so head units with these technologies could rise in demand. He felt the new features might take a few years to catch on so we could see speakers topping car radios in two years, only to see car radios rise to the top again the year after.
“There’s a lot of innovation going on in the car, which makes it very interesting to predict what’s happening in 3 or 4 years,” he said.
Update: Sales to consumers of in-dash navigation in 2014 totaled $75.1 million, down 3 percent. So if you include navigation in the mix, speakers would have a longer ways to go in matching total in-dash sales. By 2014 numbers, total in-dash player and in-dash navi sales totaled $341.8 million compared to sales of speakers at $232.9 million.
Also of note, unit sales of car radios saw an 11 percent decline in 2014 and a 6 percent decline in 2013.
true at my shop already.