One Analyst Sees the Better Side of Best Buy

By Christina Cheddar Berk, News Editor

NEW YORK (CNBC) -- There has been a lot of criticism of Best Buy(BBY) in the wake of the unexpected resignation of CEO Brian Dunn, but at least one industry analyst thinks that much of the criticism has been ill-informed and "fact lite."

In a blog post on the NPD website, peppered with market share statistics, Vice President of Industry Analysis Stephen Baker lays out the case that Best Buy remains the dominant retailer in its category and is "in the best position" to succeed in the coming years.

Best Buy has been doing "pretty well in coping with, and managing, the changes to its business, preserving its legacy strengths while moving as rapidly as possible toward a future of which no one has an exceptionally clear vision," he said.

Baker bases his argument on the market data his firm collects. For example, he explains Best Buy's share of consumer technology revenue in 2011 stood at 19 percent of hardware sales. That's exactly what it was in 2010 and what made it the leader in sales by a substantial margin.

He also noted that Best Buy was the No. 1 brick-and-mortar retailer online and that it gained almost one point in revenue share, now 22.4% among retailers on the Internet.

In other key product categories, Best Buy continues to lead as well, he said. For example, Best Buy's market share is 10 points higher than any other outlet that sells Windows notebooks and generates two-times the revenue from those sales than any other retailer.

In declining categories Best Buy is gaining market share, including point-and-shoot cameras, DSLR cameras, and MP3 players, Baker said.