01 June 2016

Recovery in Asia and Eastern Europe to drive three per cent growth in luxury adspend in 2016

This is the second annual edition of the Luxury Advertising Expenditure Forecasts, which examines expenditure on luxury advertising in 18 key luxury markets. As with Zenith’s long‐established Advertising Expenditure Forecasts, it provides historic expenditure figures and forecasts by medium.

However, this report focuses specifically on luxury advertising, together with the sub‐categories of luxury automotive, fragrances & beauty, fashion & accessories, and watches & jewellery. The luxury ad market slowed from 2.9 per cent growth in 2014 to 1.9 per cent growth in 2015 as advertisers reacted to slowdown in the BRIC markets as well as to local conflicts and terrorism. Adspend shrank by 1.4 per cent in Asia and by a massive 20.3 per cent in Eastern Europe (mainly the result of the oil crisis and rouble devaluation in Russia), but the global total was buoyed by strong growth in North America (3.6 per cent) and Western Europe (4.7 per cent).

Zenith forecasts Asia to return to 2.9 per cent growth in 2016, while the decline in Eastern Europe slows to 2.8 per cent. North America will stay strong, with 3.9 per cent growth, but Western Europe will slip back to 1.7 per cent.

Overall, Zenith forecasts 3.0 per cent growth in luxury adspend across its top 18 markets in 2016.

Luxury advertising is growing less rapidly than advertising as a whole. Across its top 18 markets, luxury advertising grew by 2.9 per cent in 2014, compared to 5.6 per cent for advertising as a whole, and 1.9 per cent in 2015 (compared to 4.1 per cent). It forecasts this underperformance to continue, with luxury advertising growing 3.0 per cent in 2016 compared to 4.5 per cent growth across all categories.