There are 145 TV sets, 81 washing machines, 75 refrigerators and 70 vacuum cleaners per 100 households. Sales of desktop and laptop PCs reach 800,000 units a year.
“The market stood at about one million units last year, and 2016 forecasts point to 1.4 million units. The TV market went up about 40% by volume and 25% by value in the first eight months of the year,” Lucian Radulescu, Cluster Head Sony Romania and Republic of Moldova, told ZF.
There are many things that explain the growth, such as the increase in consumer spending because of the VAT cut and the European Football Championship, he added.
Sony is among the top five premium (‘A’) TV brands in Romania.
However, it was the C category brands (generally cheaper models) that saw the highest growth. Their sales rose by 2.5 times compared with 2015.
“The C brands have grown quite a lot. Sales of C brands stood at 230,000 to 250,000 units last year, and this year’s projection is 560,000 to 570,000 units.”
A brands, on the other hand, are seeing moderate growth in sales by volume, Lucian Radulescu said.
The average sale price of TV set stood at EUR310 in Romania in 2015 and will go down this year, because higher cheaper model sales.
The leader of the local A brand market is South-Korea’s Samsung, which has a market share of about 50% both by volume and by value.
The local TV market amounted to about EUR300 million in 2015 and is estimated to reach about EUR350 million in 2016.
The growth potential of the local TV market remains high because half of the households in the country still own CRT TV sets.
More and more Romanian consumers are buying smart TVs, so the sales thereof went up 23% in the first eight months of the year. They also came close to 50% of the total TV sales in Romania last year.
“More than 80% of the over 45” models are smart TVs,” Sony Romania official said.
Sony sales of over 45” TVs doubled in Romania in January-August.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)