Newspapers No Longer the Number 1 Ad Medium

Well, newspapers, you had a nice run, but it's over now. In 2008, for "the first time in U.S. history," newspapers won't be the biggest recipient of ad spending. According to a new forecast by the private equity firm Veronis Suhler Stevenson, broadcast TV will attain that distinction this year -- only to lose it to the internet by 2011.

At the moment, consumer spending, not advertising and marketing, is propelling growth in the media economy: The former is expected to rise 6.1 percent his year, to $218.37 billion, while the latter will climb only 0.4 percent, to $378.48 billion.

But the real crunch will come next year, as the hangover effect from this year's corporate profit declines kicks in without an Olympics or a presidential election to mask the declines.

Here's VSS's breakdown of the sector-by-sector outlook (click to enlarge):

Comments

[jay fredric...:]

I don't get it. After looking at the chart, it seems as though cable and satellite have nearly twice the revenue that newspapers had in 2007. If that is true, this shift must have happened long before 2007. I wonder if this study includes total revenue for the cable companies, not just ad spend?

Jay Fredrickson

2008 Aug 06 07:31 AM