NPD recently shared some industry insights regarding U.S. consumer technology sales, accounting for trends that have emerged as Americans continue to face the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The NPD Group, as it relates to The NPD Group’s Consumer Tech Tracking (U.S. only) posted its sixth consecutive week of year-over-year 20%+ revenue growth for the week ending May 23. That particular week was the second highest in dollars in the last six weeks, and NPD claimed that they see zero indications that these historic sales volumes are slowing.
According to their research, overall ASPs are up approximately 14% and units are up approximately 11% during the last 5 weeks.
Notable revenue increases include:
- Smart home (+26%)
- PC monitors (+93%) – in fact, this was the 11th consecutive week over 55% unit & $ growth
- Tablets (+56%)
- Keyboards (79%), Mice (+58%), Headsets (+163%)
- Inkjet printers (+87%)
- Laser printers (+56%)
- The last six weeks represents the only time within the past five years that printer ink ASP is $100+.
Notable unit increases include:
- SSDs (+39%)
- Graphics cards (+137%)
- Streaming media (+52%)
- Hard drives (+42%)
- Sound bars (+28%)
- Network range extenders (+129%)
- Routers (+45%) — + 57% in mesh and +39% in standard routers
- In fact, all of these are posting double-digit unit and dollar increases for the last 7 weeks.
Both Windows notebook and Chromebook units were up in the mid-40% range.
- This marked the slowest growth from Chromebooks in past 11 weeks. It also marked the best week of the last 4 weeks for Windows.
- Chromebook ASPs are at a record $279. Windows under $1,000 were up 47%. Gaming (desktop and notebook) have been up 47% over last 7 weeks.
Since the start of April, TV sales are up 1.7 million units year-over-year versus 2019:
- In the week ending May 23rd, volume was up 21%, which was the slowest since the first week of April. ASP at $360 was highest since mid-February.
- 32” TVs increased 47%. TVs at 65” & above are up 55%. 65” TV ASP at $681 was the highest since 3rd week of February.
