Harry Potter Casts Spell on Entertainment Industry

The Harry Potter phenomenon has cast a powerful spell on the entertainment industry for years, and the upcoming release (July 21) of the final book installment, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” and last week’s movie release of “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” are the occasions for Nielsen’s assessment of the Harry Potter franchise’s impact, writes MarketingCharts.

A smattering of Harry Potter data from Nielsen’s various services:

• Book sales (Nielsen BookScan): Since 1998, when Nielsen began measuring book sales in the United Kingdom, the six Harry Potter books have sold more than 22.5 million copies in the UK alone. In the United States, the Harry Potter titles published after 2001 have sold more than 27.7 million copies.
• Box office sales (Nielsen EDI): Combined, the first four Harry Potter films have grossed more than $3.5 billion worldwide. The first film, “Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone,” is the fourth highest-grossing film worldwide.

• Advertising (Nielsen Monitor-Plus): In the US, ad spend for all Harry Potter branded merchandise (including books, movies, DVDs and other promotional products) totals $269.1 million from 1998 to date. Outside of the US from 2000 to date, $119.3 million was spent on total advertising for all Harry Potter branded merchandise in Canada, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, South Africa, Switzerland, and the UK.

• DVD/video sales (Nielsen VideoScan): All three Harry Potter DVDs/videos - Sorcerer’s Stone, Chamber of Secrets, and Prisoner of Azkaban - debuted at No. 1 and remained the No. 1 family film for the first 3 weeks of each release.
• Internet traffic (Nielsen/NetRatings): The Warner Bros. “Harry Potter Order of the Phoenix” website drew 446,762 unique visitors in May 2007.
• Internet buzz (Nielsen BuzzMetrics): On blogs, the final book “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” is generating more “buzz” than the latest movie installment, “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.”
• Music sales (Nielsen SoundScan): The four Harry Potter soundtracks combined have sold more than 1.1 million copies in the US and almost 100,000 copies in Canada since the initial release back in October 2001. There have been a total of 180,000 downloads of individual songs that tied to the four Harry Potter soundtracks.
• TV ratings (Nielsen Media Research): Since 2002, the Harry Potter movies have aired on US television a total of 366 times.

• Moviegoer profile (Nielsen Cinema): A recent survey of moviegoers shows 51 percent of persons age 12+ are aware that the new book is coming out next month; 28 percent of persons 12+ in the US have read one or more of the previous Harry Potter books, and 15 percent have read all of the Harry Potter books to date.
• Consumer (ACNielsen): More than $11.8 million has been spent by US consumers on Harry Potter-licensed trademark cookies, candy and gum products since June 2002.

Nielsen conjures up more data than you can shake a wand at… here.