Australia's retail advertisers have been revealed as the largest advertising spenders from any product category in the 2017 financial year, according to research from the Standard Media Index (SMI).
Total investment in advertising grew by $90 million over the course of the financial year, accounting for 9% of all advertising.
The fastest growing category for retail advertising was outdoor which increased by 50.2% to $54.2 million, followed by digital, with spending jumping 29.1% to $153.8 million.
Television remained the preferred media for retail advertisers with total ad spend growing 13.2% to $268.4 million.
SMI ANZ managing director Jane Schulze said the growing spend by retailers in Australia could be attributed to the news of Amazon's arrival.
“The large increase in advertising investment by Retailers is clearly due to the intense battle in the supermarket category, as well as the imminent entry of Amazon which will see a surge in retail advertising activity.
“Nonetheless we expect the market to continue exhibiting underlying growth due to increasing competition within certain segments and the continual product development on the media vendor side which produces even more ways to target potential purchasers.’’