• Mediaweek , Monday, October 26, 2009 10:04 PM

As holiday retail season nears, advertisers are slowly returning to the malls. Several categories have significantly increased spending in the second half of the year, per Eye Corp., which sells advertising in 250 malls nationwide.

Pharmaceutical, insurance and sports marketers spent four times as much on mall advertising between July and October, compared to last year. Energy and fuel, fashion and communications categories have doubled spending. "We're not seeing growth limited to one or two areas. The ad dollars are coming in from virtually all sectors," says David Gibbs, CEO of Eye.

But it's hard to gauge whether the spending boost will translate into growth for the mall segment. Most forecasts peg the total out-of-home medium will be down about 5% in 2009.

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