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Overall BD/DVD Sales, Anime Sales Rise in Japan in 2009

The Oricon survey firm presented its market report for 2009 home video sales in Japan on Friday. Oricon pegged the market last year at 273.721 billion yen (about US$3.0459 billion), based on data gathered from 25,120 retail stores, internet dealers, and other outlets from December 29, 2008 to December 27, 2009. That is an increase of 6.4% over 2008's sales data.

While Blu-ray Disc sales stood at 25.695 billion yen (US$285.9 million), 2009's DVD sales were 248.025 billion yen (US$2.76 billion) or 98.4% of the previous year's DVD sales. The ratio of DVD sales to Blu-ray Disc sales was 90.6 to 9.4. In all, 53.923 million items were sold — 50.524 million DVD releases and 3.398 million Blu-ray Disc releases.

Anime and special-effects titles made up 59.8% of the Blu-ray Disc market (or 15.4 billion yen/US$171 million) and 25.1% of the DVD market (or 62.27 billion yen/US$693 million). In all, anime and special-effects Blu-ray and DVD sales rose 9% from 71.5 billion yen (US$796 million) to 77.7 billion yen (US$865 million). Anime and special-effects DVD sales dropped 9%, but anime and special-effects Blu-ray Disc sales more than made up the difference.

The Japanese distributor Bandai Visual had the largest share of the market at 14.823 billion yen (US$164 million) or 5.4%. Warner Home Video followed behind at 13.604 billion yen (US$151 million) or 5%, and then TBS Video at 13.077 billion yen (US$146 million) or 4.8%. #4 was Aniplex at 12.912 billion yen (US$143 million) or 4.7%, and #5 was Walt Disney Studio Home Entertainment at 12.09 billion yen (US$135 million) or 4.4%. The remaining distributors were Geneon Universal Entertainment (3.9%), 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment (3.4%), VAP (3.3%), Rhythm Zone (3.1%), Fuji TV (3.1%) and "others" (58.9%).

Source: AV Watch, animeanime.biz