Why I think Ayumi's sales have fallen...

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The reasons why I think Ayu's sales have been falling compared to its previous generations likely might have been these reasons:

• Ayu's already 31 and a half years old, so I think older artists are kind of losing ground compared to newer, younger generations. Take a look at aiko for example also: her latest album "BABY", her first album in two years, might have gotten #1, but the fact is that the first week sales were 135,541, compared to Himitsu's 167,490, but only a #2! With the fact that Ayu's NEXT LEVEL last year sold 240,810 and her latest Rock'n'Roll Circus album sold 205,058, I think we're seeing to start her signs of aging there. Even lately younger generations have been on the surge: YUI (23 years old), born also out of Fukuoka, where Ayu was born, has six #1 singles and two #1 albums (excluding MY SHORT STORIES), and the "to Mother" single is expected to be quite a hit, mainly because of a big significance that YUI moves on to the piano, and not just playing the guitar, with the fact that she already has a four-single #1 streak, and a decent fanbase. But that's not all:
• Competition from particularly Johnny's members - particularly Arashi - has put a pressure on Ayu's sales also, and in combination, the digital revolution. More people are wanting this album through digital download to their iPod or such, and not really physically buying a single or album at a store like digitally, as we are in an age of iTunes and such. However, Arashi, along with other Johnny's groups, have a bit more fanbase, and I don't know about this yet, and this is quite unconfirmed (if anyone knows, please let me know), but most likely the reason why Arashi's sales are considered by me "inflated" is because that Johnny's groups DO NOT sell their music through iTunes or some sort, leaving fans to buy it at a store rather than going on those digital music sites.
• Finally, with the fact that we've got more artists than just Ayumi Hamasaki, such as Ai Otsuka, Kumi Koda, BoA, etc., and after those early-mid-2000s era of commercialization (all because Avex wants money but then all of a sudden came a scandal/feud that involves Ayu's producer Max Matsuura), it really went into a downward trend of sales for Ayu, as we already know it, and it's just time to move on.
• And yes, Ayumi Hamasaki has only one effective hearing ear - when she announced it at the beginning of 2008, that really shocked the entire Ayumi Hamasaki community, and at a time that Ayu's GUILTY album was being released, the factors of lower sales ongoing, and Kobukuro's strong showing with its 5296 album and its Japan Record Award win with the hit song Tsubomi, it seems that the fans are really re-thinking about the situation with Ayu.

Also, the fact is that there are also Ayumi Hamasaki fans who also like Kumi Koda or such, and even another group of Ayumi Hamasaki fans that are also taking a look at new artists, such as Sayuri Sugawara, miwa and such. (It's really an embarrassment for me to download miwa's "don't cry anymore" when I was watching Ayu doing an interview broadcasted live over the Internet! And I already miss Ayumi Hamasaki's long hair - I kind of partially like the short hair, but I just feel that I miss the long hair that she had in her commercial peak around 2002-2003 and the time when I jumped in to the Ayumi Hamasaki community in late 2006/early 2007, at a time what it would be my favorite song, JEWEL, was in full swing, and I was not even familiar that I would see an announcement that A BEST 2 would be coming at the end of February 2007!)

Overall, I think we are aware of it, that it seems that time has really passed, and we have to understand we have to cope with the current economic struggles and the different personal opinions that the Japanese, the Americans and the world have. And that includes the opinion of Ayu - it seems that it's becoming more of a lower of a priority now. It's good that she's got some promotions, but I know it was quite a bit of a disappointment when Ayu released the NEXT LEVEL album last year, but she only performed on TV only once.

And, as we know, Ayu has not taken a break from her professional career singing since the time between she was kicked out of Columbia Records around 1996 after her failure of "NOTHING FROM NOTHING" and the introduction to Avex in 1998. I think I've already have enough or some sort, but we just have to move on.

I still like Ayu, and I am still a fan of Ayu, but sure enough we've got competition, as with competition in business (Intel-NVIDIA-AMD, Sony-Panasonic-Toshiba-JVC, Honda-Toyota-GM-Ford-Chrysler, ANA-JAL-Skymark, AT&T-Verizon-Qwest). I don't know how will Ayu will cope with today's current competitive J-pop market environments...