36% of the Australian population live in regional TV market areas, a total audience potential of 7,972,000 people.
The vast majority of the regional population live and work in well developed towns, cities and urbanised coastal areas where they enjoy a lower cost of living and high quality of life.
An analysis of ABS population data in regional markets shows just under 75% of the residents of aggregated regional TV markets are living in or adjacent to a city of 30,000 or more people.
Urbanisation
The recent history of population movement in Australia has centred on two phenomena, the move to cities and the move to the coast. Both the seachange and treechange phenomena have meant that the regional population has enjoyed a prolonged period of high growth.
The total population of east coast regional markets has grown by almost 10% since 2001, 35% higher than the growth rate in Metro markets. This has brought a concentration of spending and the development of more retail, entertainment and community facilities to ‘regional hub’ towns and cities.
According to the ABS around 80% of sea changers are people under 50 with families. To understand the lifestyle and motivations of people who have made the shift read the personal profiles on the thatsmylife website.
