Boca Raton, FL – If you know someone who picked up the guitar or ukulele as a hobby during the pandemic, you aren’t alone. No instruments saw a bigger surge in year-over-year demand during the first months of the pandemic than ukuleles (+66%) and guitars (+47%), according to a new data analysis from Pattern (a global ecommerce company).
Ahead of “Buy a Musical Instrument Day” on May 22, the data science team at Pattern tracked consumer demand (or the number of people shopping for a given item during a given period) for musical instruments and accessories on Amazon during every day of 2019 and 2020 to understand how the pandemic has driven consumers to pick up a new hobby or altered preferences for how to pursue music.Here’s what they found:
Early in the pandemic
- No instrument saw a bigger surge in year-over-year demand during the first months of the pandemic than ukuleles (+66%). Guitars (+47%), pianos/keyboards (+32%), harps (+28%), and flutes (+27%) round out the top five.
- Conversely, trombones and violas saw the largest negative shifts in year-over-year demand during the beginning of the pandemic, each down -27% compared to March-April 2019.
As the pandemic wore on
- Looking at 2020 as a whole, guitars saw the biggest lift in total demand compared to 2019 (+21%), followed by pianos/guitars (+12%), ukuleles (+11%), harps (8%), and drums (+5%).
- Conversely, trombones (-48%), trumpets (-35%), clarinets (-30%), oboes (-28%), and saxophones (-27%) saw significant decreases in total demand in 2020 compared to 2019, most likely due to many k-12 students opting out of band and orchestra while social distancing measures are in place.
You can view the full analysis (including charts) here.