MRG – Irish Night: Republic Of Ireland TGI
The MRG held an Irish night on Monday 3rd, chaired by Nick Hiddleston (McCann Erickson). The brief this time was to look at some very recent changes in Irish media planning. This included, obviously, the changes that the current peace has brought, but, more specifically, the meeting covered the benefits of the new Target Group Index survey (TGI) in the Republic.
Speaking at the meeting were Gary Hill (Gary Hill Media), Geoff Wicken (BMRB) and Dave Harland (Initiative Media). All three opened their talks with the same point, that Irish media planners are no longer viewing Ireland as two countries and two markets, but are shifting to a view of a ’32 county Ireland’ (that is, the 6 counties of Ulster and the 26 counties of the Republic).
Gary Hill, speaking first, gave a broad description of this present Irish market. He listed both its benefits and shortfalls, but tried to emphasize the opportunities that lay there for UK advertisers.
There is, for example, a very young population across Ireland, with a median age of only 27, compared to a figure of around 37 in mainland Britain. Ireland also claims the lowest rate of over-60s in the EC. There is a potential audience of 1 million students, and there is a steady move from rural areas into urban areas. However, less favourable statistics show unemployment in the North rising up to 20%, while many in the Republic face tax rates of 48%. Overall, though, Gary Hill was encouraged that UK advertising companies were making more use of this Irish market – with more advertising, longer campaigns and the use of an increasingly wider range of media.
A more detailed demonstration of how to plan in this market was given by Dave Harland, covering all of the different media across Ireland. His dry message was that Ireland was two countries, one media market, and one very confused media planner.
An answer to this confusion, however, could be provided by the launch of the TGI survey for the Republic of Ireland. Geoff Wicken, representing BMRB, suggested that the ultimate aim would be to provide 5 databases for Britain and Ireland – one for the mainland UK, one for Northern Ireland, one for the Republic, then a combination all-British, and a combination all-Irish.
The first TGI survey was carried out in Britain in 1969. Despite its success, it took 23 years before it expanded, creating a new Ulster TGI in 1992.
Fortunately, it was not such a long wait before the next step, last year’s Republic of Ireland TGI. Geoff Wicken described how the next stage was to improve the reliability of the two Irish surveys. The Northern Ireland TGI will increase its sample size from 1254 in 1994 to 1500 this year, out of an adult population of 1.2 million. The Republic TGI will increase from 1974 to a planned 3000 this year, out of a total adult population of 2.6 million. Then in the longer term, efforts will be made to iron out the differences that currently exist in data recording and weighting between the Republic and Ulster, and to move towards those 5 comparative Irish and British databases.