The Christmas campaign, concentrated on the last 10 days of the year, is one of the Market’s busiest periods and one that sees a substantial rise in sales.

This fact is well known and, thanks to the study the Central Fish Market management has made of sales performance in the 2005 to 2010 Christmas campaigns, can be translated into specific figures.

Considering the totality of the products sold at the Fish Market, the study found that, over Christmas, daily sales rose by an average of 30% compared to the rest of the year. This figure is even higher if only species that are popular Christmas fare are studied.

The report looked at 14 varieties of fresh fish traditionally most in demand at Christmas (hake, angler fish, gilthead, common bream and so on), 21 varieties of fresh seafood (prawns, langoustine prawns, Dublin Bay prawns, clams, etc.) and 23 frozen fish and seafood products.

Amongst these products, average daily sales rose by 65% in relation to the rest of the year. The most significant growth was in fresh seafood, where average daily sales skyrocketed109%. Frozen fish sales were also up at Christmas. The study found an average daily increase of 73% in the past six years.

Finally, fresh fish sales also intensified, but more discreetly, increasing 22.5%.

Caption: Graph showing the performance of average daily sales of the leading Christmas fishery produce over the past six years, comparing the weeks of the Christmas campaign with the rest of the year