Weekly television digest (Jan-Dec 1960)

18 DECEMBER ?.6, I9BH 1950 WASN'T TOO BAD: In 1960's waning days, there's tendency on part of economists to apply the word "recession" — and to predict we'll be out of it by mid-1961. Recession or no, 1960 still turned out better than 1959 (or any other year to date) in consumer-electronics market, with total factory sales estimated at about $2.1 billion, roughly $100 million better than last year. Nearly all of the gain over 1959 was made in first half of this year, which started out as boom market. In late spring, TV sales began to lag; by fall, phonographs were feeling the slump. But despite increased imports, radios continued to sell somewhat better than hotcakes. And even with the 2nd-half dip, it looks as if TV retail sales were slightly better than 1959, while phono sales have been considerably better — and in each case dollar volume per unit sales increased. Just g year ago, we forecast "gains on all fronts" for 1960 (Vol. 16:1 pl7). Like everyone else in industry, we were over-optimistic in our appraisal of TV sales (we said 6.1-to-6.2 million at retail), but we take what we hope is pardonable pride in pointing out in our 1960 review below just how accurate we were in most of our predictions. Let's look now at the main branches of consumer electronics and how they fared in 1960: TV: Retail sales totaled about 5,785,000 sets, up slightly from last year's 5,749,000, although distributor sales to dealers were about 5.7 million, well below last year's 6 million. TV production for year was 5.75 million, down considerably from last year's 6.35 million — largely due to heroic last-quarter effort to bring production in line with sharply reduced sales. This effort succeeded, and TV industry enters new year with total inventories about 150,000 sets lower than last New Year's Day. Biggest TV news of 1960 was continued upgrading of production — and success of this program at the market-place. Average factory price of TV sold this year was about $146 (we predicted $145 last year), up from $141 in 1959. Public increased its purchases of high-end sets, and TV-phono combination sales hit an all-timehigh share of market, 3.7% (up from last year's 2.8%). Consoles rose to 45% of sets sold (from 38.7%), table models & portables dropping to 51.3% (from 58.5%). This year saw almost complete replacement of 17-<5t 21 -in. sets by 19 & 23-in., which we also foresaw in our predictions, although the 19-in. set hadn't yet been introduced at the time. Color TV warmed up a bit but didn't catch fire. (Last year we forecast sales 30-50% higher than 1959. which still sounds about right to us.) Phono: "Three-channel stereo" bit the dust last year, reverb came along and appeared to be headed for same fate — but phono sales kept rolling. Last-minute sag failed to prevent full year from seeing sales of about 4.5 million units at retail (up from last year's 4.4 million). We had forecast "well over 4 million." Some 75% of phonos sold at retail this year were stereo — up from 62% last year — and average factory price of phonos went up from $87 to $92 (we were a little optimistic when we predicted "nearly $100"). Phono factory sales will total about 4.6 million in 1960 — up from 4.3 million. Radio: Sales were really hot this year — about 10.2 million sets at retail, plus another 6.5 million auto sets (we predicted nearly 10 million & at least 6 million car sets), compared with 8.9 million & 5.56 million in 1959). Radio production in 1960 totaled about 17.5 million (including auto). FM radio continued its phenomenal increase and set an all-time record. If you include not only FM & FM-AM table models (as EIA does in its figures), but component timers, TV & phono combinations and imports which contained FM, total sales in 1960 reached about 2 million (we predicted considerably more than 1.5 million"), compared with 1.4 million in 1959. Imports: Japanese radio exports to U.S. totaled about 7.5 million units (exactly what we predicted last year), up to an all-time record from 6.1 million last year. Sets with 3 transistors or more totaled 4.4 million, vs. 4 million in 1959. The increase was slight due to Japan's new quota system — tube radios and toys (less than 3 transistors) making up most of the increase. About 10,000 TV sets were imported this year first time there's been significant number brought in. So much for 1960. What of 1961? On the following pages, you'll find our roundup of industry leaders' forecasts for the coming year. Next week we'll go out on the limb ourselves.