37% of Comcast Customers Buy 3 or 4 Products

One set of numbers from the Comcast third quarter 2017 results is instructive: Comcast details the number of customers taking single, dual-product and three-product or four-product packages.

About 30 percent of consumer customers buy just one product, a third buy two products, while 37 percent buy purchase or four products.

That matters for revenue, as a buyer of multiple products produces more revenue than an account purchasing just a single product, all other things being equal (such as the unit price of each type of product).

More significantly, purchases of bundles determine the viability of the business case itself.

Stranded assets are big problems in highly-competitive fixed network markets. Assume a typical local market where the local telco and the local cable operator are equally skilled, but where cable has an advantage in the internet access and sometimes video product segments.

Assume a typical market share structure has the cable operator getting about 60 percent market share, while the telco gets about 40 percent.

That means the telco has no revenue generated from 60 percent of its passings, while cable gets no revenue from 40 percent of consumer locations passed.

But multiple service purchases effectively boost revenue as much as having more accounts in service. In other words, selling more things to fewer customers can produce as much revenue as selling one product to nearly every location.

And that is why take rates for multiple-product bundles matter so much: business models that would fail in a single-product environment  can work, even at significantly-lower rates of customer adoption.  

Comcast Account Segments (accounts in thousands)
Category	3Q 2016	3Q 2017	Net Adds 3Q 2016	Net Adds 3Q 2017
Residential Video Customers	21,420	21,341	19	(134)
Business Services Video Customers	1,007	1,049	13	9
Total Video Customers	22,428	22,390	32	(125)
Total High-Speed Internet Customers	24,316	25,519	330	214
Residential Voice Customers	10,527	10,351	(24)	(119)
Business Services Voice Customers	1,116	1,214	26	25
Total Voice Customers	11,643	11,565	2	(94)
Total Security and Automation Customers	815	1,079	78	51
Residential Customer Relationships	26,312	26,957	175	83
Business Services Customer Relationships	2,006	2,146	43	31
Total Customer Relationships	28,318	29,104	217	115
Single Product Residential Customers	7,722	8,055	51	125
Double Product Residential Customers	8,682	8,983	97	38
Triple and Quad Product Residential Customers	9,908	9,919	26	(79)
source: Comcast