The UK has always been a very receptive market for PlayStation; while Sega had made some inroads there before, the original PlayStation was the first console to truly break into the mainstream there. Through the years, Sony has continued to cater to the region exceptionally well, and PlayStation is basically synonymous with console gaming in the region.
How can I just make such a statement without backing it up, you ask? This sounds like confirmation bias fueled anecdotal evidence, you say? Well, no, I have some empirical evidence on my side here. According to an analyst, PlayStation is the third most recognized brand (among all brands, period) in the United Kingdom, behind only Apple and LEGO (which were #1 and #2 respectively). This means that not only did PlayStation beat out its competition Xbox and Nintendo, it also is more recognizable to the general public there than brands such as Coca Cola, Amazon, Starbucks, McDonalds, Microsoft, and Google, a word so ubiquitous that we’ve basically made a verb out of it.
And what of the competition? Surprisingly enough, given that this is the UK, a market famously hostile to Nintendo, the Big N comes out ahead of Xbox here. Nintendo is the eleventh most recognized brand in the country, narrowly missing the top ten. Xbox comes in at seventeen.
So, yeah- the next time someone tells you that PlayStation’s dominance in the UK could be overturned, point out the sheer inertia going in Sony’s favor.
