Top 10 / 25 media spenders in the Middle East Watch & Jewellery Sector by country for 2009 for H1-2009; Comparisons with H1-2007 & H1-2008

Lebanon, Kuwait buck the trend with increased advertising spend in H1-2009 over H1-2008; Saudi Arabia reports modest growth of 4 %

Ad spend declines in the Middle East in H1-2009; UAE & Qatar lead the decline with ad expenditure declining by 31 % and 24 % over the previous period

Rolex, Lazurde, Cartier, Swatch & Chopard among top spenders

In this special edition of the MPParabia Market Report for July 2009, we provided a comprehensive analysis of advertising spend for the first half of the current year—for the period January to June 2009 (H1 2009), for the watch, jewellery and accessories sectors across the Middle East. Comparisons have also been made with corresponding figures for H1-2007 and H1-2008. Included in this study were Markets Ranking & Media Split, category split by regional markets, split by products, monthly spend analysis, overall media split analysis and cumulative advertising expenditure separately for Watches & Clocks and Jewellery & Accessories categories individually for H1-2007, H1-2008 and H1-2009.

Here we examine the top 20 / 25 media spenders in every country of the region. The total expenditure of each brand by region—GCC or the Levant and big spenders by media category—Television, Newspapers, magazines and other top payers are individually listed in this report.

Providing the synopsis of the media data provided by Pan Arab Research Centre (PARC), was M. Shaharyar Umar, Product Manager. According to Shaharyar Umar, the ad spend decreased in the region (pan Arab, GCC and Levant markets) decreased by 14 % in H1-2009 over H1-2008. The UAE and Qatar led in the decline with ad spend tumbling by 31 % and 24 % respectively, compared to the same period for the previous year, whilst Saudi Arabia registered a modest increase of 4 %.

PARC is the pioneering Marketing Research Company in the Arab world with over 30 years of practiced regional insight and a workforce of 400 plus dedicated research professionals.

Key considerations:

• Over 250 top, premium, international watch & jewellery brands were surveyed in this extensive report

• Media: Magazines / Newspapers / Television / Outdoor / Radio & Cinema

• Internet advertising has not been included

• All figures are in USD $ 000s

• GCC: Gulf Co-operation Council comprising the Arabian Gulf States of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and the UAE

• Pan Arab: Mix of Print Media / TV and Radio stations across the Pan Arab world

• Levant: Primarily Lebanon, Jordan and Syria

• For the purpose of this survey, advertising costs have been computed from the respective rate cards of individual publications. Barters, discounts and other considerations have not featured in this study.

• In this series, PARC—Gallup International has examined the media expenditure for specific brands as well as for principals / franchisees / retailers in the watches, jewellery and accessories both collectively and singularly for the Middle East region.

• The media has also been classified into Pan Arab Media which includes cross border TV stations such as MBC, LBC Sat, Future International (Al Mushtaqbal), Al Jazeera (Qatar) and Al Arabiya (UAE) to name a few; trans-national print media (publications with multi-country circulations) & regional radio stations.

The spenders have been arranged (vertically) in descending order of magnitude—highest down to the lowest:

Table I: Top 10 Markets Ranking

All media / 000 USD $ / Ys H1-2007, H1-2008 & H1-2009 & % variance—2009 over 2008