During Q42011, Gray Television recorded gains in local and national advertising revenue, realized almost 50% in internet revenue. But the story is the same old same old for a television company – the election cycle was on the downside of the revenue roller coaster, and the loss of political accounted for the company’s red-ink bottom line.
The company was pleased with the results, which it said exceeded expectations. And even though 2011 was an off-election year, Gray still managed to bring in $13.5M for the full 12-month period, exceeding its previous off-year record by $3.5M.
Revenue was down 11% for the full year.
Gray Q4 2011 result highlights
* Local advertising revenue increased $1.3 million, or 3%, to $50.8 million.
* National advertising revenue increased $0.5 million, or 3%, to $16.1 million.
* Internet advertising revenue increased $1.9 million, or 49%, to $5.8 million.
* Political advertising revenue decreased $28.6 million, or 86%, to $4.6 million.
* Retransmission consent revenue increased $0.2 million, or 3%, to $5.0 million.
* Production and other revenue increased $0.1 million, or 8%, to $1.8 million.
* Consulting revenue decreased $5.3 million, or 91%, to $0.6 million from our agreement with Young.
Our five largest local and national advertising categories on a combined local and national basis by customer type for the fourth quarter of 2011 demonstrated the following changes during the period compared to the fourth quarter of 2010:
Top five advertising category results
* automotive increased 17%
* restaurant decreased less than 1%
* medical increased 18%
* communications decreased 2%
* furniture and appliances increased 6%
Gray 2011full year result highlights
* Local advertising revenue increased $3.9 million, or 2%, to $187.0 million.
* National advertising revenue decreased $1.3 million, or 2%, to $56.3 million.
* Internet advertising revenue increased $6.7 million, or 50%, to $20.1 million.
* Political advertising revenue decreased $44.1 million, or 77%, to $13.5 million; however, 2011 was a new “off year” record.
* Retransmission consent revenue increased $1.5 million, or 8%, to $20.2 million.
* Production and other revenue decreased $0.4 million, or 5%, to $7.1 million.
* Consulting revenue from our agreement with Young decreased $5.3 million, or 71%, to $2.2 million.
Top five advertising category results
* automotive increased 6%
* restaurant increased 1%
* medical increased 12%
* communications increased 3%
* furniture and appliances increased 7%
Here is the company boilerplate: “Gray Television, Inc. is a television broadcast company headquartered inAtlanta,GA. We currently operate 36 television stations serving 30 markets. Each of the stations’ primary channels are affiliated with either CBS (17 stations), NBC (10 stations), ABC (8 stations) or FOX (1 station). In addition, we currently operate 40 secondary channels including 1 ABC, 4 Fox, 8 CW, 18 MyNetworkTV, 1 Untamed Sports Network, 1 The Country Network affiliates and 7 local news/weather channels in certain of our existing markets. “
