PC Accessories Purchases Booming, IDC Says

While PC prices dipped in 2009, the little-noted PC accessories market took on steam and still continues to grow. In report released June 29, research firm IDC found that U.S. consumers spend more money on their PC accessories than they do on the systems themselves.

In 2009, consumers in the United States spent $1.05 on PC accessories and peripherals for every $1 they spent on PCs - which was up from 87 cents on the dollar just a year earlier. IDC now expects that in 2010, U.S. consumers will spend $28.6 billion on products and services designed to enhance the performance of their PC - or their enjoyment using their devices.

"While security and anti-spam software remained the most popular products, consumers continued to focus their spending on PC performance enhancements, such a graphic cards and additional memory and storage," states the report, "as well as expanding their own user experiences with media creation products and software."

The "Beyond the Box" survey additionally found consumers increasingly parting with their dollars online. While brick-and-mortar retailers such as Best Buy continue to dominate the PC and PC accessories markets, says IDC, "PC users have moved en masse toward a Web-centric environment, and cloud-based activities are on the rise."

Productivity products, however, have slipped from top billing - which points to a need for vendors, manufacturers and distributors to gain a better understanding of consumers' behavior, IDC said.

The survey also tracked the spending of small businesses, which IDC defines as having fewer than 100 employees. The group was found to be spending nearly 24 percent of their computer shopping budgets - or $2.7 billion a year - on PC accessories.

"This research is meant to shed some light on a substantial portion of the personal computing segment, the accessories market, which has not been adequately tracked in the past," David Daoud, an IDC research director, said in a statement. "With the trend of a multi-PC per user environment, the accessories market will play a growing role in insuring seamless integration of all the devices in businesses and households."

Daoud added the users' needs for solutions that reliably enhance their PC experience, improve productivity and offer heightened security ensures that "the accessories market will continue to expand going forward."