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Japanese Anime DVD Sales Drop 13.5%, Partly Due to BD

The Japan Video Software Association announced its survey results on Japanese video software sales in the first half of 2008. The overall market, which includes DVDs, Blu-ray Discs, HD DVDs, and UMDs, was 94.9% of the sales in the same period last year. However, the sales of Japanese animation DVDs for general audiences fell further to 86.5% of last year's total. Similarly, the rentals of Japanese animation DVDs for general audiences fell to 88.1% of last year's total. Nevertheless, anime made up 27.4% of the Japanese DVD sales.

The sales of high-definition discs is credited with part of the anime DVD sales' decline, as overall HD disc sales rose 195.5% from last year to 2.266 billion yen (US$21.68 million). That is still just 1.6% of the overall video software sales market; at 139.032 billion yen (US$1.33 billion), DVDs make up 98.2% of the total market. Japanese animation for general audiences made up 20.9% of the high-definition disc sales. The average Blu-ray Disc price was 3,867 yen (US$37.00 or a 9% increase from last year), while the average DVD price was 3,399 yen (US$32.53). On a related note, the Amazon.co.jp retail store anounced that all of its top 10 Blu-ray Discs (in sales and pre-orders) in August were anime:

Source: AV Watch