I think a lot of people have hit a lot of different factors on the head here. First of all, I want to say that for the current economic situation, Ayu's sales ARE very good. No, not as good as Mr. Children or DTC, but good.
While people do enjoy entertainment more during a recession, I do think that there is another factor in Japan that people aren't thinking about much. That is CD rental. I've been talking to some of my Japanese friends, and right now they are saying "I don't have the money to buy, I'll wait for album ABC to be released for rental." Every major Japanese CD release is available for rental about 2-3 weeks after it's released for purchase. Many people wait and rent. They don't buy it physically or digitally, they
rent it and copy it that way.
This means that people who are my students age (high school) d/l one or two songs they really love to their keitai, and rent CDs later on. Same with people in their early 20's, from what I've heard from friends. The people who
buy physical albums are typically skewed older - from their late 20's and up. Why? Because they have better paying jobs, and are used to buying physical CDs. Therefore, bands that appeal to an older crowd, such as DCT and Mr. Children, sell well, while Ayu, who skews younger (aside from her established fan base) won't sell as much.
Ayu is still popular, some people call her an oba-san, but most people say she is still "kawaii" and I have heard GREEN played from a student's phone between classes, as well as seen the A symbol attached to a student's bag. One of my HS classes even actually sang and danced to Inspire for the school festival.
In other words - don't worry about sales in terms of Ayu's popularity, she's still going strong. Not as strong as 2002, but she's not going to disappear anytime soon.
