Nearly eight of every 10 retail buyers of financial software selected Intuit Inc.'s (NASDAQ:INTU) Quicken, TurboTax or QuickBooks during the December 1997 sales period, according to PC Data. In December, as they have since their respective launches, the three financial software products once again led their categories by wide margins as measured by share of retail sales and share of dollars spent at retail.
Quicken 98 was the number one best selling personal financial management software in December 1997, a position Quicken has held every month since PC Data began collecting industry data in 1991. For the sales period, Quicken outsold consumers' distant second choice, Microsoft Money, by a margin of 81.5 to 18.5 percent as measured in units. The Quicken superiority over Money was even more pronounced when measured by dollar sell through -- Quicken outsold Money by an 88.8 percent to 11.2 percent margin, measured by share of dollars spent at retail on personal financial management software, according to PC Data.
TurboTax was the number one best selling tax preparation software during December 1997, the overwhelming choice of 88 percent of consumers purchasing federal and state tax preparation software at retail. Intuit also led share of dollars spent at retail, where it claimed 92 percent of all the money consumers spent on tax preparation software during the month, as reported by PC Data. The major competing product was unavailable for a large part of the month.
According to PC Data, QuickBooks has averaged more than 80 percent share of both units sold and share of dollars at retail during the past 12 months. During the month of December 1997, QuickBooks accounting software was selected by 79.9 percent of retail customers over competing small business accounting software. QuickBooks, which has enjoyed the number one sales position at retail for five years in a row, also claimed 80.5 percent of dollars spent at retail on small business accounting software during the reporting period.
"Intuit has been the market leader in personal finance, tax preparation and small business accounting software by a wide margin for many years," said Ann Stephens, president of PC Data.
The December 1997 PC Data research tracked sell through data in units and dollars at 42 retail chains and mail order companies representing more than 70 percent of U.S. retail sales.
Data reflects sales from the month of December, 1997.
