Top 10 Ad Agencies See Billings Drop, Whilst Media Agencies Rise
The UK’s top ten advertising agencies saw their combined billings revenue fall by 1.1% – or £27.1 million – in 2002, according to the new top 300 table published by Campaign.
The figures, compiled by Nielsen Media Research, show that whilst the advertising downturn has pushed the top agencies’ revenues into negative growth for the year, it is nevertheless only a slight decline.
The table also shows that the top ten agencies have remained the same year on year, with AMV BBDO top of the pile, commanding billings of £341 million – albeit a 14.6% decline on the previous year.
| Top 10 UK Advertising Agencies | ||||
| 2001 billings (£m) | 2002 billings (£m) | Actual change | % change | |
| Abbot Mead Vickers BBDO | 399.3 | 341.2 | -58.1 | -14.6 |
| McCann-Erickson Advertising | 292.7 | 298.5 | 5.8 | 2.0 |
| Lowe | 270.1 | 274.9 | 4.8 | 1.8 |
| Ogilvy & Mather | 258.6 | 273.4 | 14.8 | 5.7 |
| M&C Saatchi | 219.6 | 251.5 | 31.8 | 14.5 |
| Publicis | 250.5 | 250.3 | -0.1 | -0.1 |
| J. Walter Thompson | 240.3 | 244.9 | 4.5 | 1.9 |
| Saatchi & Saatchi | 226.4 | 234.3 | 7.9 | 3.5 |
| Bates UK | 206.9 | 183.3 | -23.6 | -11.4 |
| Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe/Y&R | 192.4 | 177.5 | -15.0 | -7.8 |
| TOTAL | 2,556.7 | 2,529.6 | -27.1 | -1.1 |
| Source: Nielsen Media Research/Campaign | ||||
Media agency groups
The UK’s top ten media agency groups, meanwhile, turned in a positive growth of 5.4% year on year, according to the Nielsen Media Research billings figures. Their combined billings rose by £231 million to £4.5 billion in 2002.
The MediaCom group of businesses moved to the top of the table, up from third position the year before, with billings up 7.1% to £611 million. Last year’s number one media network, Carat, dropped back to number three in 2002, with billings down 7.2% at £564 million.
| Top 10 UK Media Agency Groups | ||||
| 2001 billings (£m) | 2002 billings (£m) | Actual change | % change | |
| MediaCom | 570.41 | 610.8 | 40.4 | 7.1 |
| Zenith Media | 592.65 | 603.3 | 10.6 | 1.8 |
| Carat | 607.35 | 563.5 | -43.9 | -7.2 |
| MindShare Media | 484.39 | 513.2 | 28.8 | 5.9 |
| OMD | 320.85 | 401.9 | 81.0 | 25.3 |
| MediaVest | 388.42 | 378.4 | -10.0 | -2.6 |
| Starcom Motive | 306.6 | 372.4 | 65.8 | 21.4 |
| Initiative Media | 345.26 | 365.8 | 20.5 | 5.9 |
| Universal McCann | 309.2 | 364.6 | 55.4 | 17.9 |
| PHD | 328.57 | 311.0 | -17.6 | -5.3 |
| TOTAL | 4,253.7 | 4,484.8 | 231.1 | 5.4 |
| Source: Nielsen Media Research/Campaign | ||||
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