Beasley Reports Q1 Revenues of 48.2 Million

RADIO ONLINE | Wednesday, May 5, 2021

Beasley Media Group

Beasley Broadcast Group reported first quarter net revenue fell to $48.2 million from $57.7 million in 2020. Station operating income declined to $5.2 million from $6.7 million. Operating loss was $2.5 million compared to $7.1 million. The company posted a net loss of $10.6 million (-36 cents per diluted share) as compared to a net loss of $8.8 million (-32 cents) in the year-ago period.

During the three months ended March 31, 2021 results reflects a year-over-year decrease in commercial advertising revenue and a lack of non-traditional revenue (NTR) and event revenue primarily related to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, in addition to lower cyclical political advertising revenue, partially offset by a year-over-year increase in digital revenue.

CEO Caroline Beasley said, "Beasley reported 2021 first quarter financial results consistent with the expectations we outlined when we reported the 2020 fourth quarter, as our strong revenue growth in the first two months of the comparable 2020 period, prior to the onset of the pandemic, created a difficult year-over-year comparison. Though we continued to experience challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic during the first quarter, I am pleased to report that we began to see a strong recovery. As a result, we expect Beasley to return to top-line revenue growth beginning in the second quarter of 2021.

"During the first quarter, we continued to advance our digital transformation and revenue diversification initiatives across the Company. In this regard, Beasley generated digital revenue growth of approximately 10% on a year-over-year basis, with digital accounting for approximately 12% of total first quarter revenue, compared to 9.3% of total revenue in the prior year period. Consumer demand for digital audio content remains strong and with our ongoing emphasis on digital innovation, Beasley continues attracting new business by successfully targeting the sale of non-radio products to non-radio advertisers. With the continued strong growth of our digital business, Beasley will report digital revenue as a separate segment going forward. We believe this milestone represents an important inflection point in the ongoing evolution of our operating model and clearly highlights the value of our revenue diversification strategies.

"The actions we have taken over the last year to realign our cost structure and improve efficiencies across the organization drove a year-over-year reduction in first quarter operating and corporate expenses of 15.6% and 13.5%, respectively. We believe our ability to extract meaningful expense savings out of the business provided us with the ability to make strategic investments in our commercial sales infrastructure, which will enable us to maintain our market competitiveness so we are best positioned to deliver on our revenue goals as we move deeper into the recovery phase of the pandemic."