More buyers will barter in bid to seal ad deals

Corporate barter company Astus UK predicts the media barter sector will achieve billings of £250m by 2014.

Astus
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Media barter allows companies to trade off excess inventory or services with media owners to part-pay for media spend.

Companies from the retail and FMCG sectors have led the way in using media barter. Media campaigns worth £19.5m are expected to be bartered from these two sectors alone in 2010. The value of the sector is expected to top £169m by the end of the year.

Astus arrived at its figure after analysing Companies House data for all barter companies and talking to industry stakeholders. Other companies operating in the sector include Active International and Miroma.

The latter recently signed up Procter & Gamble veteran Bernhard Glock as a non-executive director. He left the multinational as its vice-president of global media and communication last September.

Astus says that although the barter sector has undoubtedly been helped by the recession, growth has been aided by the introduction of a new risk-free trading model the company developed and that has been adopted as standard.

Mark Green, European trading manager for media buying network Aegis, says “We think barter use will increase provided it continues to offer the opportunity for both clients to hold and increase marketing spend and also for media suppliers to attract incremental revenue, which is especially relevant in the current environment.”