Advertising market in ‘modest recovery’: Corus

Canada’s television advertising market has moved to a stage of “modest recovery” after chapters of COVID-19 pandemic induced “shock and awe,” followed by a stabilisation period, Corus Entertainment Inc. CEO Doug Murphy told Wednesday’s TD Securities Telecom and Media Conference. The shock and awe period, beginning in mid-March, consisted of three to four weeks of cancellations “across the board” as advertising shut down discretionary spending, Murphy told TD Securities analyst Vince Valentini. At the tail end of that period new advertising campaigns, mostly focused on the pandemic, offset the cancellations as the industry began to stabilise, Murphy said, while the period of modest recovery started in the last two to three weeks. “In the last few weeks of May we’ve put on more business for May itself than we would have put on at the same time last year,” Murphy said “Now that shouldn’t be surprising because if you cancel your Q3 campaigns in the shock and awe chapter you got some catching up to do in the backend of the quarter, but we are seeing a modest recovery. Whether that sustains going into the fall, to be continued, we’re pacing a little behind on Q4 right now but we like our schedule and as the fall schedule starts to firm up we’re liking what we see there as well.” Murphy said he was cautiously optimistic that the worst was behind Canada’s television advertising sector because other countries had demonstrated a “similar trend in these chapters and the recovery we’re in,” and Corus had a full complement of sales staff to capitalize on the improved sales activity. Corus deferred the declaration of its dividend during its second quarter earnings call last month due to financial uncertainty stemming from the pandemic, but Murphy said at the time that the company was “well positioned to weather this and we are acting decisively in managing our operations and financial position with the utmost of prudence.” Asked by Valentini if there was any indication the Department of Canadian Heritage or the CRTC would “do something a bit more bold and a bit more expedited to reform the system,” Murphy said it was irrefutable that all Canadian broadcasters who provided news services had demonstrated the importance of that product during the pandemic and that the “playing field needs to be levelled,” so Canadian companies faced the same conditions as foreign internet companies and broadcasters. The broadcasting telecommunications legislation review panel (BTLR) report released in January recommended companies such as Netflix Inc. and Facebook Inc. be subject to the Broadcasting Act, and a coalition of media companies has lobbied the federal government to force Facebook and Alphabet Inc. to compensate news outlets for using their content. “As regards to my discussions with Heritage, the senior technicians over there are 100 per cent supportive, it’s getting the will of the politicians to fall over the line,” Murphy said. --With reporting by Adam Langenberg at alangenberg@thewirereport.ca and editing by Anja Karadeglija at akarad@thewirereport.ca

Advertising market in ‘modest recovery’: Corus

News | May 27, 2020

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Advertising market in ‘modest recovery’: Corus

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