TNS: U.S. advertising recession enters the second year

Posted by Erina Lin on September 16, 2009 at 4:09 PM

U.S. ad expenditures were down14 percent in the second quarter, as well as first half of 2009, as automotive and finance companies slash their budgets, according to TNS Media Intelligence, Bloomberg reported.

The spending totalled US$60.9 billion in the first half this year, which shows an improvement from last year, TNS said in an e-mailed statement Wednesday.

The decline is the fifth straight quarter from April to June in 2008, now entering its second year.

Radio and newspapers saw the biggest decreases, with 25 percent and 24 percent, respectively, as consumer-product companies have cut marketing money on them, according to TNS.

"This represents billions of lost revenue. Early data from third quarter hint at possible improvements for some media due to easy comparisons against distressed levels of year- ago expenditures," said Jon Swallen, senior vice president of at TNS, Bloomberg reported.

Internet display advertising and free-standing inserts were the only gainers in the first half of the year, up 6.5 percent and 4.6 percent, respectively.

Magazines was ranked the third biggest loser, after radio and newspapers. It was down 21 percent, while both trade publications and Spanish-language magazines dropped 27 percent, according to TNS.

Television advertising reported a 10 percent decline, mostly due to local ads which were down 27 percent. Network ads fell 5.5 percent, while cable down 3.6 percent and Spanish language TV ads 13 percent.

Housing-related advertising shrunk 29 percent to $3.03 billion, Bloomberg reported.