Ringier "hit hard by corona, but less than feared"
The coronavirus pandemic has also left its mark on the Ringier Group: A collapsed advertising market and canceled sports events have caused operating profit to fall significantly in 2020. However, it was less severe than feared.
"We were hit hard, but less hard than we feared because the second half of the year was even better." This is how Ringier CEO Marc Walder summarized the pandemic year 2020 at the virtual media conference on Thursday.
Operating profit before depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) fell to CHF 84.4 million last year. In 2019, it had still amounted to CHF 114.1 million. This corresponds to a decline of 29.7 million francs. Sales also fell significantly - from CHF 984.8 million to CHF 953.7 million.
On the one hand, this was due to the slump in the advertising market, which other media companies are also struggling with. On the other hand, Ticketcorner owner Ringier suffered particularly from the fact that no events took place. "Ticketcorner experienced a full braking to zero, until today," said Walder.
The digital marketplaces were also mixed, particularly the job platform Jobscout24. The economic uncertainty led to a drop in fluctuation among Swiss companies, resulting in far fewer job advertisements being published.
However, individual Ringier companies achieved higher sales precisely because of the pandemic - such as Geschenkidee or the food delivery company "Bistro.sk" in Slovakia, which Walder says is now the market leader.
Corona pandemic costs two years
Ringier was able to absorb a considerable part of the pandemic-related loss of revenue through cost-cutting measures. Nevertheless, the EBITDA margin fell from 11.6 to 8.8 percent last year.
According to Walder, it will take two or even more years for Ringier to return to the level of profitability that was planned in the pre-corona period.
Ringier, on the other hand, had a good year in terms of journalism because the pandemic triggered a great need for information. "The platforms experienced an incredible boost," said Walder. The figures have risen massively, including those of paying readers. Walder is now determined to keep these good figures up, even when coronavirus is over. (SDA)
