Mobile-phone sales down, LCd TV sets up

Many brands such as Nokia and Samsung have started to launch proactive promotional campaigns to stimulate demand. At the Mobile World event held at CentralWorld, which just ended last week, both Nokia and Samsung dumped phone prices by almost 50 per cent.

Consumer finance activities, especially hire purchase, have also dropped by more than 30 per cent over the first five months.

The Bank of Thailand recently adopted a policy towards commercial banks and financial institutions to be quite strict in granting hire-purchase loans. As a result, some hire-purchase activity

has been replaced by cash and

credit cards, which have grown respectively by 2 per cent and 40 per cent over the five-month period.

GFK also reported that sales of LCD TVs had increased by 35 per cent over the first five months thanks to the Euro 2008 football competition, which kicked off at the weekend.

The main buyers of mobile phones are school and university students as well as first-jobbers. These groups of young consumers like to change their devices quite often, in line with the latest phone fashion trend.

"The current high inflation has affected the purchasing power of medium- to lower-income people and they have adjusted their shopping behaviour to cope with the situation of having less money in their pocket. They need to manage their money carefully," said Power Buy president Suthisarn Chirathivat.

Suthisarn said the main buyers of LCD TVs were people of 30 years and up.

"Power Buy achieved 45-per-cent growth in sales of LCD TVs in the first five months of the year. The growth has been driven by the recent campaigns of Power Buy Expo and EURO @ CentralWorld," he said.

Suthisarn added that Power Buy targeted 10-per-cent growth in sales this year. The company reached Bt11 billion in sales last year.

"We missed the target slightly in the first five months of the year due to a significant drop in sales of mobile phones," he said.

Meanwhile, Central Group yesterday rolled out "The 3rd Central Group Junior Marketeer" project to offer a chance for undergraduate students to create marketing plans and compete for the HRH Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn Trophy and scholarships worth more than Bt800,000.

The objectives are to seek talented young marketers and provide out-of-classroom experience to students. Winners will gain a chance for a career in the Central Group's companies.

This year, the project will be hosted by Central Retail Corp and administered by Power Buy.