Mainland shoppers boost Hong Kong's adspend in August

The Hong Kong consumer market retained its upward momentum during the summer holidays, resulting in significant adspend growth to a total of US$391.26 million (HK$3.05 billion) for the month. 

According to the data collected by AdmanGo, this marked an increase of 18 per cent from a year earlier, but a decline of 3 per cent when compared with July.

After the recent spate of food safety scandals in China weakened consumer confidence in mainland products, many mainland travellers came to Hong Kong to purchase locally-made milk powder and other products, the research found. 60 per cent of advertising expenditure in the beverage industry came from formula milk brands, which hit a 143 per cent year-on-year growth in August.

Abbott Laboratories, Friso, and Mead Johnson, who each have formula milk brands under their umbrellas, each adopted similar media strategies, by spending more than 60 per cent of their ad budgets in the TVC medium.

In the leadup to the mid-autumn festival, mooncake marketers also competed fiercely to target mainlanders, increasing their adspend by 57 per cent and doubling their outdoor media budgets.

In the banking industry, personal loan ads recorded an increase of 60 per cent and became the top spending sub-category among banks.