Talk of a business press revival has cooled after it was revealed that US B2B advertising pages fell by almost 10% in July.
The latest data from
American Business Media (ABM) shows that ad spending was 7.9% lower in July 2003 than in the same month last year. Pages declined by 9.7% with all twelve categories down year on year.
Following on from the gains made in June (see US B2B Ad Volumes & Spend On The Rise), these figures are somewhat disappointing. However, late summer is seen a blip and in the year to date, spending was flat and pages were down just 4.1%.
| US Business To Business Adspend By Sector, July 2003 |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
Jul-03 |
Year To July |
| |
Revenue ($000s) |
Year On Year Change |
Revenue ($000s) |
Year On Year Change |
| Finance, Business & Advertising |
102,496 |
-20.2 |
916,455 |
-4.5 |
| Telecommunications |
15,101 |
-16.8 |
102,961 |
-28.6 |
| Computers |
40,283 |
-15.3 |
292,520 |
-12.6 |
| Software |
48,231 |
-17.3 |
418,334 |
-9.9 |
| Manufacturing & Elec. Equip., Mat’s & Components |
43,073 |
-15.1 |
347,108 |
-5.4 |
| Drugs & Toiletries/PERQ |
79,179 |
9.3 |
630,129 |
7.1 |
| Horticulture & Farming |
5,849 |
-8.5 |
82,781 |
-8.8 |
| Services, Direct Response, Classified |
123,369 |
0.6 |
932,569 |
9.3 |
| Retail |
49,339 |
1.7 |
385,031 |
14.2 |
| Home & Building |
41,404 |
-11.0 |
334,340 |
3.2 |
| Automotive |
38,862 |
5.4 |
272,914 |
26.5 |
| Travel |
26,722 |
-11.9 |
212,439 |
-14.8 |
| Total |
613,908 |
-7.9 |
4,927,582 |
0.0 |
| Source: American Business Media, September 2003 |
“July and August were slow months this year, so I don’t expect to see increased activity until late September,” said Gordon Hughes, president and CEO of ABM. “But we are still comfortable with our projection of 3% growth in ad spending and 1% to 2% growth in ad pages for the year. We’re also estimating single-digit growth in early 2004.”
