Advertising beer is still good business even after new legal restrictions

Despite the restrictions in advertising, breweries have maintained their level of expenditures for advertising in the first quarter of 2002 in comparison to the same period of 2001. According to a report made by Expert Monitor, a Wroclaw based company, the breweries spent zl. 39.99 million on advertisement in the media over the first three months of 2002 in comparison to slightly higher expenditures of zl. 40.62 million for the same period last year. The expenditures on TV commercials fell sharply by almost zl. 5 million compared to 2001, due to the stringent law on advertising alcohol, which came into effect in September 2001. However according to Jakub Benke, a director general of Starcom media house, television has remained a major advertising medium. The breweries spent zl. 32.7 million for TV commercials by the end of March this year. The Zywiec group is a top advertiser spending zl. 20.6 million over first three months of 2002, which is over half of the amount of total expenditures of all breweries. The second place is held by Kampania Piwowarska, which assigned zl. 14.3 million to media promotion. Brau Union had increased its expenditures from 0.07% to 9.4% of total expenditures, by spending zl. 3.7 million on promoting its beer. (Puls Biznesu, p. 3) P.W.