• by Wayne Friedman , June 29, 2020

A new local advertising forecast will show a dramatic 13.1% slowdown for this year -- with growth potential only weak to slightly down in the coming years.

Borrell Associates says the steep drop this year is a revision of an earlier estimate, which showed a slight increase of 1.3% for 2020. The decline is due to expected disruptions resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Borrell expects a decline of 1.3% in 2021, followed by a 1.5% gain in 2022, a decline of 0.5% in 2023 and a 1.9% hike in 2024 -- and says the declines exclude political advertising.

In April, BIA Advisory Services said advertising across all local media platforms was estimated to sink 3.6% to $144.3 billion in 2020.

Last month, BIA also lowered estimates for local TV’s over-the-air/digital media for 2020 to $18.5 billion -- down from an earlier projection of $19.4 billion.

Over-the-air TV ad revenue is now estimated to drop 5% to $17.0 billion (down from $17.9 billion) while local TV’s digital revenue will remain the same at $1.5 billion.