MP3 players lead US Consumer Electronics boom

If you are producing audio content for sale then here is something to consider - The five fastest-growing consumer electronics products in the US all use recordable or recorded media of some kind, whether optical disc, memory card, hard disc or some combination of these.

The MP3 player is the fastest-growing US consumer product, according to new research from the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA). Household penetration has jumped ten percentage points from 15% in 2004 to 25% in 2005. "With the overall CE industry expanding 11% on a revenue basis in 2005, it is understandable that the household penetration of a handful of categories responsible for driving this double-digit revenue growth have gained momentum over the past year," said Sean Wargo, CEA director of industry analysis.

"The MP3 player… is the only category to have tripled growth in a year.” Eight million MP3 players were sold in 2004, but the figure rose massively to 25 million last year. He added that an additional 30 million units will ship in 2006, “which puts MP3 right up there with televisions.” The study found that the five most owned products in US households are televisions (95% household penetration), VCRs (87%), cordless phones (85%), DVD players (81%) and wireless phones (78%).

More industry information and buying trends can be found at www.ce.org