Statistics Canada
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Radio Broadcasting Industry
2007
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Highlights
- In 2007, private radio’s advertising sales jumped 6.0% to reach $1.5 billion, outpacing the advertising market as a whole (+5.5%) for the third time in the last five years.
- The profit before interest and taxes of 19.8 cents per dollar of revenue represents a slightly inferior performance from that of the last two years but it is nevertheless the industry’s third-best showing in the past 30 years.
- In 2007, FM radio had advertising revenues of $1.2 billion, 7.1% more than in the previous year. FM radio generated a little over 78% of the industry’s advertising revenues in 2007, compared to 63% ten years earlier.
- FM stations also accounted for almost 95% of the industry’s profits before interest and taxes in 2007. The healthy 24% profit margin achieved in 2007 is comparable to the margins reported over the last five years.
- AM radio’s advertising revenues increased slightly to $320.3 million and its profit before interest and taxes was down 7.4% from 2006 after three years of rapid growth.
- Ethnic radio stations enjoyed a higher rate of growth in advertising sales (+7.3%) in 2007 than their English-language and French-language counterparts (+6.6% and +2.7% respectively). English-language stations reported the best profit margin (+21.4%), followed by French-language stations (+13.8%) and ethnic stations (+7.9%). This order has remained unchanged since 1998.
- Radio stations in large markets generated almost twice as much profit before interest and taxes per dollar of revenue as stations in smaller markets. On the other hand, advertising revenues showed stronger growth in small and medium-sized markets (+7.4% and +8.3% respectively) than in large markets (+4.0%). This situation last occurred in 2002.
- The performance of radio broadcasters varied substantially from one region to another in 2007. Air time sales grew at a faster rate than the national average (6.0%) in the Atlantic provinces, Alberta and British Columbia and at a slower rate than the national average in the other provinces.
