2010 WILL BE A MILESTONE year for digital and entertainment product spending as Canadians look to buy new gadgets and upgrade their existing gear, according to the quarterly Digital Life Canada study by Toronto’s Solutions Research Group (SRG).
Some 57% of Canadian households (7.5 million) will upgrade a major household entertainment product this year with HDTVs, Windows PCs and Blu-Ray DVD players topping the list.
However, HD digital set-top boxes and DVRs are much lower down the list, which suggests that cable and satellite companies are leaving money on the table when it comes to household entertainment spending, says the report.
On the ‘personal’ digital product front, wireless devices – especially smartphones – lead the way for new purchases or upgrades, followed by laptops and game consoles. The average Canadian consumer will buy or upgrade two devices on average while younger Canadians will upgrade or buy three.
Most consumers have heard of the iPad and many are interested but seven-in-ten of those interested will wait for the fall or Christmas season to buy. Interestingly, many would consider buying a competing product from Dell, Sony or HP should those companies release slates with similar features at slightly lower price points, according to the research.
Consumers’ desire for more digital entertainment hardware is still not translating into paying for more content though. A special analysis of iTunes (the only full-featured digital content marketplace available in Canada) suggests that almost 70% browse but don’t buy – and vast majority of the paid content are relatively low-priced items (individual songs and apps).
Among other notable findings from Digital Life:
• Gaming is mainstreaming further; 46% have played using a console, up four points in the past two years.
• In households with both DVRs and video on demand, DVRs are used much more frequently and preferred 3-to-1 over VOD.
• PCs are increasingly connecting to TVs. Among 18-34s, 26% connected their laptops to a large screen TV in the last month.
These findings come from SRG’s independent Digital Life Canada syndicated study, which the company has been producing since 2006. It is based on quarterly interviews with 1,000 online Canadians aged 12 and older. The Q1 2010 research was conducted in early spring 2010.
