There is just no pleasing a network affiliate these days. NBC has been vilified (at least in the trade press) because The Jay Leno Show is not a good lead-in for the affiliates' local news programs. We haven't actually seen ABC vilified yet even though at least a couple of nights a week it is doing no better (or worse) than Leno.
Now comes word that not even the CBS affiliates are happy with the way 10pm works, even though CBS wins the hour routinely:
General managers of CBS affiliates frequently say it's a good time to be a CBS station. Primetime is thriving, particularly the 10 p.m. dramas, which are gaining ratings points against fewer scripted shows in that hour. But GMs wish those dramas ran a few minutes longer, to seamlessly serve up viewers to their stations' late news.
At the annual CBS affiliates meeting in May, the station executives voiced their concerns to the network about the 10 p.m. shows ending well before 11, pushing CBS for less cluttered lead-ins to late news this fall. But as the new season progresses, it seems their complaints have gone unheeded.
A 10 p.m. drama on CBS may end two or three minutes short of 11. While the subsequent gap features a late-news tease, it also has an array of spots, credits, scenes from next week's episode and a plug for The Late Show before local news rolls. With viewers increasingly watching TV with a laptop or iPhone nearby, there's mounting anxiety that they will tune out during the minutes-long gap between primetime programming and local news in favor of their digital devices.
While the trade press makes much ado about lead-ins to local news, the real ado should be made about this: the affiliate model is busted. In the old days, the local affiliate model made sense. It was a way for the big broadcasters to have virtual monopolies nationwide. It was the only way for national broadcasters to be national broadcasters!
Those days are gone.
Increasingly, what the local affiliates are searching for is relevancy; and the revenue that comes from being relevant. But, the local affiliates will never be as relevant as they used to be. More and more, the national broadcasters will be looking for ways to unwind from the affiliate model.
Robert beat me to this by a matter of minutes. I was all ready to entitle a nearly identical post:
“Are Local Network Affiliates EVER Happy?”
gaining ratings points against fewer scripted shows in that hour.
Isn’t CBS down at 10 pm most days? I know they are up slightly on Tuesday and Thursday, but aren’t they down significantly on Sunday, Monday and Friday? And probably about even on Wednesday?
Juila, I should take a look at that, but it’s too much work for a Sunday
Sunday news gets pushed later every other week, and I believe Cold Case is down. Plus the news competes with the end of a football game.
Monday, CSI Miami is down a bit. Friday, Numb3rs is down, but whatever.
Where’s the big boost CBS and ABC said they’d get from the Leno decision?
I don’t know what the big deal is for CBS, just copy the other networks and bleed a minute into the news.
Fine, I’ll do it.
(Using fast nationals only, not finals.)
For the week of October 11-17, 2008 (I know, it’s not Monday through Sunday, like it should be, but it’ll have to do) the 10 pm ratings were:
(There was a debate on Wednesday, so I took the average of the week before and week after for CSI: NY.)
Sunday, The Unit 2.6
Monday, CSI: Miami 3.9
Tuesday, Without a Trace 2.5
Wednesday, CSI: NY 4.1
Thursday, Eleventh Hour 3.2
Friday, Numb3rs 2.1
vs
Sunday, Three Rivers/Cold Case 1.7
Monday, CSI: Miami 4.0
Tuesday, The Good Wife 2.8
Wednesday, CSI: NY 3.2
Thursday, The Mentalist 3.4
Friday, Numb3rs 1.8
I had Mondays and Wednesdays confused, with Monday being about even, and Wednesday being down.
CBS is obviously having some trouble with Sundays, but it’s going to get rid off Three Rivers soon enough. Apparently local affiliates are like everyone else and only happy when they are bitching. It’s not like CBS’ affiliates can halfway believably claim they’d rather air Seinfeld repeats.
idizzle, it is very believable to think that affiliates might rather air Seinfeld repeats. At least with Seinfeld (or some other syndicated show) the affiliates would get to keep all the ad dollars. During primetime, affiliates get like 2 local spots per hour. They have more of an opportunity to make money if every spot in an hour is local.
LOCAL NEWS
I assume there may be a smiliar campaign in the US, but here in Canada, there are commercials airing all the time to “save the local news”, due to satelite, internet and other ways of getting television that does not ever give us our local news.
Therefore they are in the red ink by alot, and they are caving any year now! we will go to general news like CNN (the candian version).
Julia, your belief that affiliates keep “all the ad dollars” from syndicated shows is simply wrong. The overwhelming majority of syndicated shows have national ad time that is sold by the distributor.
Sony, in fact, is contemplating the upcoming fourth syndication cycle of “Seinfeld” on an all-barter basis, with Sony keeping most of the ad time and the stations getting the show for free.
Furthermore, unless the local stations were to shut down their news departments, they would no longer be able to amortize the costs against that 35 minutes of airtime.
Overwhelming majority? I admit, I’m not an expert in syndication sales, but from speaking to a programming director at a local station which runs both a network affiliate and an independent station, my understanding is that most are cash sales.
Julia: most syndication sales are cash plus barter, with the distributor retaining a portion of the ad time for themselves.
Few are all-barter, when the syndicator gives the station the show for free plus ad time. But that number is growing as the broadcast model changes.
And very, very few are the old-fashioned straight cash deals, with all the ad time for stations and allowing a limited number of runs of each episode.
I don’t understand why netlets like CW and myNetTV won’t just dump their affiliates and become cable networks.
Is the carriage fees they would have to pay to cable providers is biger than what they have to split with the affiliates?
TomKH, my knowledge of the cable marketplace is far from complete, but I’m not sure that if CW and MyNet stopped being broadcast networks they could automatically negotiate channel positions from MSOs like Comcast or Satco’s like DirecTV and DISH. Anyone else know more about how that might work?
And to your question, while we see cable carriage fee numbers from time to time, I know nothing about the economics of the local broadcast affiliate model in terms of relative payment amounts.
My local CBS news is awful. When Jay Leno runs to 11pm, I still switch the channel. I dont think what airs at 10pm helps you choose a local news. I stick with the local ABC news everyday.
At this point, CW and MyNet have affiliates who cover the cost of all but 10 (I think MyNet is 15?) hours of the week. Would having to fill the other 158 hours be worth it, even if they could become cable nets?
I too am curious about how CW and MyNet would negotiate channel carriage to become cable outlets.
Julia, Tyra was moved to CW exclusively, though still sold through syndication, along with a rerun, so that’s two more hours each weekday. The Kids’ WB (or whatever it’s called now) is another two or three hours on weekends. CW is at least 22. I believe My is only the ten hour primetime package.
But your larger point is taken, but they can just air stuff from the WB/Turner/CBS library at first.
That’s still 146 hours they would have to fill. Did MyNet give up Sat and Sun? I thought they used to program them.
I’m going to echo RJ on this one. I think people what a particular news broadcast because they like the way that broadcast is presented and not because of its lead in. My family members tend to watch NBC’s or WGN’s (same channel as CW) local news regardless of what channel they were watching before that. We watch those because we like the format and the particular presenters. Newscasters become local celebrities and people definitely have preferences about who they get their news from.
If the CBS affiliates have a problem with people sticking around for their local news then maybe they need to make their local news something to stick around for.