Q3 Sales Drop 3.9% at GfK

The GfK Group has reported a 3.9% drop in third quarter sales to EUR 282.7m, and a 4.9% decline in sales for the first nine months of the year to EUR 840.2m (prior year EUR 883.8m).

In the third quarter of 2009, adjusted operating income - which reflects the ratio of adjusted operating income to sales - rose to 13.5% from 12.6% in the second quarter of the year.

In Q3, the Custom Research division generated sales of EUR 170.9m, while income for the period was slightly down to EUR 10.6m from the prior year figure of EUR 10.8m.

For the first nine months of 2009, sales in the Custom Research sector were down 10.5% to EUR 506.4m, while income nearly halved to EUR 17.1m compared with EUR 32.2m in the first nine months of the previous year.

In the period July to September 2009, sales in the Retail and Technology division increased 5.4% to EUR 80.4m, compared with EUR 76.3m in the prior year period. In the first nine months of the year, the sector achieved a sales increase of 8.3% to EUR 237.4m.

The Media sector made sales of EUR 30.6m in the third quarter, while income was down from EUR 5.1m in the second quarter to EUR 3.4m in the third quarter of the year. This was attributable to the firm's North American subsidiary launching the set-up process for syndicated business aimed at measuring advertising effectiveness in print media, which cost an initial EUR 1.8m to set up.

In the first nine months of 2009, the Media sector generated sales of EUR 93.9, (prior year: EUR 95.8m), and overall, sales decreased by 2.0% compared with the prior year. Income for the sector declined by a total of 35.8% to EUR 12.5m in the period January to September 2009.

The firm is anticipating that the Custom Research sector will continue to be affected more severely by the economic crisis than Retail and Technology and Media, whose performance is expected to be steadier in view of panel business.

GfK's management introduced additional cost-cutting measures in the first three months of 2009 including reduction in personnel costs through short-time working, a hiring freeze, in-sourcing, salary cuts and redundancy programs.

In addition, the firm's BISS (Business IT Services and Streamline Services create Synergies) re-structuring programme achieved EUR 12.5m in cost savings during the period under review.

'In view of the challenging economic situation, the results highlight that our strategy and our active cost management have paid off,' said CEO Klaus Wübbenhorst. 'I am confident that GfK will emerge stronger from this economic crisis.'

Web site: www.gfk.com .

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.

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