Consumers in Western Europe spent 46.5 billion euro on technical consumer goods in the first quarter of 2010, an increase of 2.7% in total compared to the same quarter in 2009, according to GfK.

Nearly all sectors involved experienced growth. All GfK TEMAX countries reported positive or stable trends. When excluding currency effects, the UK market also grew by 2.1%. These findings are based on GfK TEMAX for Western Europe.

The previous publication of GfK TEMAX for Western Europe identified the first signs of recovery. A return to growth was evident for three sectors in Q4-2009. For the period of Q1-2010 this trend has continued, with all sectors, besides Office Equipment and Consumables seeing positive development.

LCD-TVs soar

Consumer Electronics, also in Q1-2010 the largest sector, achieved 12.1 billion EUR, an increase of 00.7% on Q1 2009. The impact of the crisis on the CE markets no longer exists. Several trends were causal for this positive result.

Most countries in Europe have seen a huge consumer demand in replacing the old CRT-TV with flat-panel TV. The share of 40% is growing strongly, with the World Cup in South Africa is supporting this trend. With the stabilisation of prices over the past months, revenue also saw an improvement.

The digital switch over is another contributing factor to the growth in this market. With analogue TV being phased out new set top boxes or even a new TV set are required to receive digital TV channels. Spain witnessed a result of this with a 16% increase, Italy with 6.9% and Portugal with a 4.4% increase.

Home entertainment in general saw substantial impulses from Bluray, Home Theatre Sets, Loudspeaker Sets and of course High Definition set top boxes. In all of these markets higher average prices were realised.

Consumers' willingness-to-invest in flat screens, HD and better sound systems for the home, is a clear sign of the "homing-trend". The willingness-to-invest combined with the anticipated impact of the World Cup for the most important product group Flat TV, gives reason to expect an even better second quarter 2010.

Cameras remain popular

In the photographic market, sales value amounted to almost 2.0 billion euro, and faced an increase of 2.7% on the same quarter last year; a better result compared to the development in previous quarters in 2009.

The Portuguese and Swedish markets performed quite well, but also other markets like the Austrian, the German and the UK market grew around 5%.

For Imaging products there is a recovery particularly in Eastern Europe and a clear positive trend in Western Europe. Average prices per category were increasing as consumer demand for high quality features and new systems was rising.

HD functions in digital still cameras remain important, generating 30% of the sales volume and more than 50% in sales value; even for fixed lens digital still cameras a 30% share in HD functions exists. Another feature is wide angle with 26 mm, achieving 15% share in fixed lens cameras. Also touch screen starts to move into the markets.

Across Western Europe Multimedia Cameras saw significant growth. These are cameras with video functions and sometimes voice recording; attractive products for young and lifestyle oriented target groups who are used to sharing images and films via the Internet. Product innovations are evidently the most important drivers in the Photographic market.