HMV market share stable as grocers grab entertainment custom

Data released by Kantar Worldpanel for the 12 weeks ending March 17 – which included HMV’s collapse in January – show HMV now accounts for 17.6% of the market, dropping just 1.5% when compared with its share in the final quarter of 2012.

Amazon remains the market leader with a 2.9% advance in share to 21.8% year-on-year.

The grocers performed strongly in the quarter with Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Asda all increasing their share of the video, music and games sectors. Tesco now holds a 12.2% share of the market, Asda 10.5% and Sainsbury’s 6.5%.

Kantar Worldpanel consumer insight director Fiona Keenan said: “The supermarkets have had a really strong first quarter, driven predominantly by the huge success of [James Bond film] Skyfall. Their aggressive pricing and large advertising campaigns lead to them taking over 80% of its sales to date.”

She adds: “There is still work to be done for HMV, particularly when we look at its decline over the past year and the growing dominance of its rivals.

“The growth of digital music has played an important part in its performance. Sales of digital music grew by 12% in quarter one compared with the same period last year and now account for almost half (47%) of all music purchases. Amazon has been fast to react to this trend, making it the largest music retailer and helping to push up its overall share within entertainment by 2.9 percentage points. HMV will need to act quickly to regain some of this market.”

Keenan added that Game is well placed to pick up former HMV games customers and could increase its 4.3% market share, which is 3% down year on year following its administration last year.