CRA RELEASE:The commercial radio industry ended 2009 on a strong note with revenue growth in December of nearly five per cent – the second consecutive month of growth for the year, according to figures released today by industry body, Commercial Radio Australia.

Figures for the month of December 2009 show growth of nearly five per cent (4.67%) in the five metropolitan markets, with the strongest growth in Sydney of 8.19% and growth in all markets except Perth. According to the 2009 Metropolitan Commercial Radio Advertising Revenue, as sourced by Deloitte, advertising revenue in the five metropolitan markets for the month of December 2009, the Sydney market grew by 8.19% to $16.55 million, the Melbourne market grew by 2.14% to $15.8 million, Brisbane grew by 8.16% to $8.9 million, Adelaide grew by 6.36% to $5.25 million and Perth fell by 1.96% to $7.62 million.

Overall for the month of December, revenue generated was $54.15 million – up 4.67% on the same month in 2008 – and followed growth of over four per cent in November.

Chief executive officer of Commercial Radio Australia, Joan Warner said despite a challenging year for all markets, and particularly Sydney, the year had ended strongly with two months of consecutive growth in November and December of 2009.

“This is positive news for the commercial radio industry and augurs well for 2010. While I will not speculate about advertising revenue forecasts for the upcoming year, the consecutive growth in the last two months of 2009 is good news for the industry and particularly the Sydney market, which recorded growth of eight per cent in December,” Ms Warner said.

Figures released for 2009, show metropolitan commercial radio stations generated advertising revenue of $626.23 million in the calendar year – a fall of 2.7 per cent compared to the previous year. Figures for the full year of 2009 show falls in all markets except for Melbourne. According to the 2009 Metropolitan Commercial Radio Advertising Revenue, as sourced by Deloitte, advertising revenue in the five metropolitan markets for the twelve months ending December 2009, show the Sydney market fell by 6.18% to $194.5 million, the Melbourne market grew by 1.32% to $189.9 million, Brisbane fell by 2.27% to $100.5 million, Adelaide fell by 1.11% to $59.9 million and Perth fell by 4.78% to $81.4 million. Overall revenue generated for 2009 was $626.2 million – down 2.71% on 2008.

Ms Warner said 2009 had been a challenging year, but the radio industry would continue to work hard in 2010 to promote the medium as a cost effective and efficient way to advertise.

”Overall the 2009 figures are better than expected in what was a tough trading year for all media, particularly in the Sydney market,” Ms Warner said.

Commercial radio continued to attract a strong audience in 2009 with an average cumulative audience of 8.94 million or 76 percent of Australians tuning in each week during the year. This was 146,000 more people than in 2008, when 8.79 million people listened on average each week, and also up from 8.74 million people in 2007. On average, Australians spent nearly 17 hours per week listening to commercial radio during 2009, or 2hrs and 24 minutes per day. *