Economic stocks took off
According to the Advertising Statistics Foundation, net sales grew by 8.6 percent in 2000—print advertising surpassed the 3-billion mark
After 1999 had already been a record year, net advertising sales also rose sharply last year: They climbed by CHF 374 million to a new historic high of CHF 4.720 billion. In 1999, the increase was slightly higher at 10.2 percent or CHF 412 million.
However, last year's figure again only reflects part of the reality. Although announced, direct advertising has now not been surveyed for the fifth consecutive year. This means that an important factor in advertising expenditure remains in the dark, as the last time direct advertising was included in 1995, it accounted for around 40 percent of total Net advertising sales. Promotional articles and Internet advertising are also still not surveyed (see box).
More than half of the growth in all media surveyed, namely CHF 197 million, was attributable to the press. With a total of 3.032 billion francs in net advertising sales, this was the first time it had managed to break the three billion barrier. Although the press achieved the highest growth of all media in terms of value, it was only in the middle of the field in terms of percentage growth, which amounted to exactly seven percentage points.
The new category of financial and economic stocks took off
Among the print media, the financial and business publications stood out in particular. In line with the classification system of the Association of Swiss Advertisers (VSW), these were combined into a separate group for the first time last year and reclassified as consumer magazines. Previously, they were not reported separately as part of the trade press. Growth in financial and business publications amounted to a full 39.2 percent or CHF 29 million.
Consumer magazines as a whole improved by CHF 42 million or 12.5 percent. The trade press increased by CHF 24 million or 6.3 percent. Job advertisements were once again the strong growth engine of the print media last year. Their net sales increased by 30.5 percent or 136 million francs.
Out-of-home advertising, radio and address books performed particularly well in 2000. All four achieved growth rates of well over ten percent.
Out-of-home advertising climbed by 18.0% or CHF 90 million. After newspapers, this is the second-largest nominal increase of all media categories. Radio advertising grew by 16.2% or CHF 19 million - by far the largest increase for radio in the last five years.
With an increase of 7.1 percent or CHF 34 million, TV advertising grew significantly less than in the previous year, when it had increased by over 20 percent. However, television also passed a milestone last year: With sales of CHF 520 million, the CHF 500 million mark was exceeded for the first time.
The directories (Yellow Pages, LTV, Swisscom telephone directories) recorded enormous growth; they recorded 16.6% or CHF 22 million more advertising revenue. However, this fantastic figure should be taken with a pinch of salt, as not all of the directories involved are published and billed strictly on an annual basis.
Teletext was up 7.1% or one million francs. Trade fairs and exhibitions increased by 3.2 percent or seven million francs. However, as various trade fairs only take place every two or three years rather than once a year, this figure hardly says anything.
Cinema advertising reported sales of CHF 45 million for 2000, CHF 3 million more than in 1999. However, this result is not comparable with previous years, as the data is based on a different survey. The French cinema advertising broker Mediavision is also new to the survey. This company entered the French-speaking Swiss market in 1999 and now has a market share of around 35% (WW 10/01). As RMB and Mediavision do not yet provide compatible data, there is no comparability with the previous year.
With another excellent result for the year 2000, net advertising sales are now on a massive upward trend for the third year in succession. The question arises as to how things will continue this year. According to Mediafocus, growth in the first four months of the current year was just 0.4 percent. Forecasts differ as to whether advertising expenditure will pick up again in the second half of the year or continue to stagnate. The suspense remains.
Without direct advertising,
Internet and promotional articles
The reason for the recent absence of direct and Internet advertising as well as promotional articles, all three of which had been announced for 2001 (WW 27/00): insufficient transparency because the relevant data was not available from all providers.
Although talks are underway with the Association of Direct Marketers, says advertising statistics project manager Rolf Blum, it was not enough to obtain all the necessary basic data this year either.
According to the announcement, the data for the web advertising was to be provided by the management consultancy firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers. However, according to Blum, doubts have arisen as to whether the figures are correct, which is why they have been dispensed with. At present, it is difficult to obtain representative figures for the Internet sector, which is still not transparent enough.
Net advertising sales in Switzerland
(excluding production costs) in CHF million
1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 Difference
Press 99/00 in %
- Newspapers incl. free newspapers 1962 1850 1850 1926 2118 2250 6.2
- Consumer magazines 251 264 229 243 337 1 379 12.5
- Trade press 356 357 365 397 380 1 404 6.3
Total press 2569 2471 2444 2566 2835 3032 7.0
Television (incl. sponsorship) 339 343 370 402 486 520 7.1
Radio (incl. sponsorship) 100 106 107 114 120 139 16.2
Cinema 34 37 39 40 42 452) --
Teletext 13 13 13 13 14 13 14 7.1
Outdoor advertising 446 448 447 468 502 592 18.0
Address books 121 121 121 118 128 150 16.6
Trade fairs and exhibitions 215 196 207 218 220 227 3.2
Total values collected 3837 3735 3747 3940 4346 4720 8.6
Promotional items 105 99 104 113 121 3)
Direct advertising 2696 3) 3) 3) 3) 3) 3)
Total-Total 6638
1) Not comparable with previous year, as individual titles were regrouped
2) Not comparable with previous year due to different basis of data collection
3) not collected
Net advertising sales 2000:
Shares of the individual media types
Total sales 2000: 4720 million Swiss francs
Source: Swiss Advertising Statistics Foundation. Advertising expenditure Switzerland
