How Dainik Bhaskar is emerging stronger from the Covid jolt

This festive season is expected to boost ad spends and accelerate the recovery of a number of mediums, including print, that suffered massively due to Covid. Leading dailies are expecting a great recovery as sectors like e-commerce, FMCG and electronics are looking to attract consumers this festive season. 

Dainik Bhaskar, one of the biggest dailies in the country, reported a 7.7% growth in advertising revenue - reaching Rs 3,951 million as against Rs 3,667 million in January 2022. As the festive season approaches, the group is expecting to surpass the 2019 ad revenue levels.  

According to Harrish Bhatia, President, Dainik Bhaskar, their retail segment has outperformed and registered remarkable double-digit growth over the August-FY19-20 base. “Normally festival season advertisement begins early-to-mid-September and peaks around Diwali. But this year, the festive excitement began Independence week onwards, along with Onam.”

“Our connection and continuous engagement with the brands has resulted in improving their trust in the power of print. Our core philosophy of reader centricity, focus on quality content along with our innovative and customised advertising solutions, have added value to the brands advertising with us. With the Indian economy growing, the demand for advertisement is expected to grow further. Ad revenues of key publications have started recovering faster over the base of FY19-20 and will grow further, whereas subscriptions are being driven vigorously to recapture the lost milestone. Our volume recovery has been consistent and now we are at par with the pre-covid level,” he added. 

Satyajit Sengupta, Chief Corporate Sales and Marketing Officer at Dainik Bhaskar, said Onam this year acted as a harbinger of a great season. “We are getting positive indications from all festive categories. Real estate, consumer durables and appliances, two-wheelers, jewellery and lifestyle, retail are all going to be heavy advertisers on print. Consumer demand combined with the ability of Print to deliver results is what advertisers are clearly endorsing,” said Sengupta. 

“At Dainik Bhaskar, our leadership position across markets which is strengthening each passing day is going to take us beyond the 2019 festive numbers by some margin. For 2022, I can say with confidence that Dainik Bhaskar would go past the pre-pandemic ad revenue number. English would be behind since they are still down quite a bit on circulation numbers. Overall, I would expect Print to be very close to the 2019 number,” he added. 

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