Predictions on the top selling entertainment goods this Christmas have been announced today, with crooner Michael Buble‘s ‘Christmas‘ album and boy band One Direction‘s ‘Up All Night‘ expected to be the bestselling music releases.
The Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA), a representative group for those selling CDs, videos and videogames, estimates that 60 million physical media products will be sold during the festive period 2011, with DVD and Blu-ray videos alone expected to shift 32.2 million units.
Trading in traditional entertainment goods has been severely dented by the rise of downloaded media in recent years but Christmas represents the sector‘s busiest period of the calendar.
ERA Director General Kim Bayley said: “Entertainment retains its crown as the most universal Christmas gift. There truly is something for everyone.”
In DVDs, the most popular titles for presents will be The Lion King (Diamond Edition), Take That Progress Live, The Inbetweeners and the Harry Potter Box Set, while the seasons most popular videogames are due to be Fifa 12 and Call of Duty – Modern Warfare 3.
Over the next three weeks UK stores are set to receive 300 forty-foot-truckloads of CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray discs and games, according to the ERA and if those products were weighed they would equal that of the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
With many retailers in the sector struggling to survive in an increasingly tough market, it is clear that securing those all-important gifting sales this year could prove decisive in a business‘ future.
Bayley added: “The numbers suggest that almost every member of the UK population will receive an album, video or videogame this Christmas. It‘s more than two per household. It is an extraordinary number.”
