GROWTH SLOWS AT OOH! MEDIA

Australia’s largest outdoor media company, and owner of Cactus Imaging, oOh!Media, saw a dip in revenue for the half year to June, on the back of a major contract loss.

However, it says it is confident of getting growth back to more like the sector’s 8 per cent growth, following the loss of the Vicinity contract, and an adjustment of another.

The underlying revenue performance was 3.3 per cent growth, still well below the sector growth rate of 8 per cent.

The company is continuing to make major investments in digital assets, but says classic, or printed, sites will remain as part of its portfolio mix.

oOh! reported a 3 per cent fall in revenue to $288.3m for the half year to June. Underlying net profit after tax fell 11 per cent to $18.2m. Statutory profit was down 10 per cent to $5.8m. oOh!'s share of the Australia and New Zealand out-of-home market fell 1.8 percentage points to 36 per cent. JC Decaux is its main rival, with QMS also a major player.

The company is “confident” that it has put attractive offers to the landlords attached to the remaining larger contracts. Also ahead is $30m in projected annualised revenue for Woollahra Council, Sydney Metro and Martin Place deals.

“There are a couple of one offs in there,” oOh! CEO Cathy O’Connor told Print21 sister title AdNews. “Obviously, when you exit a contract, as we did, with Vicinity, that will impact your revenue. And we had a slight change to a contract mix that made our non media revenue decline.”

“We do accept (the result) is still below the market opportunity, but we're confident we've moved through that,” O’Connor said. 

She said oOh! Is looking better into the latter half of the current September quarter and strong for the last three months to December.

Sydney Metro was launched the same day as the half year results announcement with a partial complement of oOh! assets. 

“We're about 40 per cent built,” said O'Connor. “If you're in Crows Nest or Victoria Cross or Gadigal, you won't see signs yet. They're coming online imminently.

“But we've got assets everywhere else across the network. At Martin Place, some brilliant signs, and a stan-out location. The new assets are just fantastic, all digital and displaying ads. The demand is pretty strong.”

The company is going full tilt with its digital assets, it has launched a double-sided large format digital billboard at one of Adelaide's busiest commuting corridors.

Part of oOh!’s Signature Series, the digital site at Gepps Cross joins two other major new out-of-home builds oOh! has launched in Adelaide this year, including Mile End on South Road, one of Adelaide’s busiest corridors and a major arterial route.