Hard sell goes soft as downturn takes toll on advertising

A NEW STUDY confirms what anyone working in advertising knows – the industry has taken a hammering in the past four years.

Commissioned by the Association of Advertisers in Ireland (AAI) and conducted by Aecom, the report entitled The Economic Impact of Advertising in Ireland found that the net value to the economy generated by the advertising industry was approximately €255 million

in 2009, a decline of approximately 18 per cent on the previous year.

Turnover in the industry reached €912 million in 2009, compared to €1.1 billion in 2008 and and the average number of employees in 2009 was 5.4 compared to 6.5 in 2008, reflecting the impact of the economic downturn and the fact that new enterprises are smaller in size than those exiting in the industry.

Between 2008 and 2011, the majority of sectors showed declines in advertising spend, with the construction and property sector unsurprisingly down 84 per cent.

The resurgence of the food sector is reflected in the fact that agriculture was the only sector to increase its spend – by 6.5 per cent in the period.

One trend that could have been predicted was the finding in relation to online: the greatest increase in advertising spend occurred in online advertising which grew by more than 20 per cent in single year – from 2010 to 2011, reaching an estimated €132 million in 2011.

The downturn hasn’t deterred young people from ticking the CAO boxes for advertising related courses.

Entrants into marketing and advertising courses, media production and design related courses increased between 2007 and 2009.