Games booming for The Hut Group

Web giant The Hut Group is fast becoming one of the UK’s biggest games retailers, after reporting a huge leap in sales last year.

For 2010 The Hut Group saw its sales rise 70 per cent to 87m, up from 51m in 2009.

The biggest growth area for the Group was in non-entertainment, with sales of footwear, health, gifting, toys and accessories up 600 per cent year-on-year. But games are a powerful part of the overall mix.

The firm’s commercial director Richard Chapple told MCV its weekly share of the UK games market in 2010 peaked at just under four per cent, with the firm hitting over ten per cent on next-gen platforms.

Video games are continuing to be really strong for us overall,” he said. We are hitting almost ten per cent market share on PS3 and Xbox 360.

We have a lot of work to do with Nintendo. You will see some super things from the team in terms of our proposition around 3DS.”

80 per cent of The Hut Group’s sales came from the firm’s own websites – such as Zavvi.com. But that doesn’t mean the firm will be placing less emphasis on its partner sites it runs for Tesco, Argos, WH Smith and Asda.

This split is great for us as a business, because it is our customers and our profit,” said Chapple. But it also means we have the resources to invest in our technology platform and the staff. It will be a benefit for all – we will not leave our retail partners behind.”