Selling less and enjoying it more

CIPA’s camera and lens shipment data from  2019 to 2022 show that Covid lockdowns around the world punched a big hole in the photographic industry, while revenues – to the camera makers, at least – have largely recovered on significantly lower shipped volumes.

It was a surprise to go back to the 2019 (pre-Covid) shipment data and see that there were over 15 million cameras shipped. In 2020 this slumped by about 40 percent, to under 9 million. In volume terms, there has been no recovery – 2022 will see that camera unit figure down to about 8 million.

However, it’s not as bad as it looks. The drop off is largely in  the compact camera segment: In 2019 there were 6,750,000 compact shipped. By 2022 there were just over 2 million.

In fact, even though numbers of cameras shipped is way down since 2019, total revenue to camera manufacturers has actually improved. In 2019 cameras shipped were valued at 587 billion yen. In 2022, total revenues will exceed 670 billion yen. Average revenue per camera has gone from around $450 in 2019 to around $930 in 2022, reflecting the dramatic drop in lower-cost compact camera sales in the period, plus growth in the high-revenue mirrorless interchangeable segment.

While total camera volumes are down from over 15 million to around 8 million, the interchangeable lens camera segment has been slowly growing, from 5,300,000 units in 2020, to 6 million in 2022, with a big uptick from 2021 to 2022. DSLRs were the dominant interchangeable lens format in 2019,and it was near line ball in 2020. By 2022, mirrorless cameras were out-shipping DSLRs by more than two to one.
The best news for camera wholesalers and retailers is that mirrorless interchangeables command a premium (per camera) of over 100 percent on DSLRs.

If we look at lenses, the picture is similar in volumes terms. In 2029 just under 14 million lenses were shipped while in 2022, shipments didn’t quite reach 10 million units. But once again, total revenues have improved on the lower number of units shipped – from  366 billion yen in 2019 to over 430 billion yen in 2022.

NOTE: CIPA has not yet released full 2022 Jan-Dec data. We arrived at 2022 full year figures by adding November monthly production figures to Jan-Nov shipment figures, reflecting the regular pattern that monthly production in any one month is generally a very similar figure to shipments the next month. So not exact, but sufficient to show prevailing trends. And three weeks earlier than the rest of the bunch!