Demand falls for larger, ‘boom time’ TV sets
Ireland’s love affair with the 40-inch television may be fading, according to the country manager of Panasonic in Ireland.
Having overtaken the 32inch television in sales and revenue in 2007, demand for 40inch TVs in Ireland has fallen back in line with the recession, said Michael O’Shea.
‘‘We goby results from[market research firm] GFK the same way as most manufacturers do,” said O’Shea. ‘‘They have showed us that the market is down, overall, by about 25 per cent. One interesting facet to that is that people seem to be edging back to 32-inchTV sets, whereas 40-inch sets dominated before the recession began.”
O’Shea said that the belated introduction of digital terrestrial television (DTT) could provide a fillip for the struggling television market.
‘‘The TV market is more difficult. What we’ve seen is slashed prices and lower turnover.
DTT should add value to the industry, but, for us, the process is painfully slow at present, especially in waiting for the DTT licences to be signed off on.”
O’Shea said that the digital camera market was performing stronger than other electronics categories, even if that only meant that sales were stagnant.
‘‘The camera market looks set to be flat, with less price erosion than other consumer electronics sectors,” said O’Shea.” For us, the Lumix is a real champion seller. It was the best-selling individual camera in Britain in August and is doing really well for us here.”
Panasonic will launch a new range of cameras and camcorders in Ireland at the end of the month.
