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Tracy Tuten

A+E Networks CEO Nancy Dubuc, the Duck Whisperer - Businessweek - 0 views

www.businessweek.com/...nancy-dubuc-the-duck-whisperer

ECUadvertising upfront Duck A&E creativity

shared by Tracy Tuten on 14 Aug 13 - No Cached
  • Inside a giant tent at New York’s Lincoln Center in May, Phil Robertson strolls onstage. He’s wearing camouflage pants, wraparound sunglasses, and a solid-black long-sleeve shirt that accentuates his signature beard, which is off-white, unruly, and of ZZ Top proportions. Before him are a multitude of linen-draped tables, where media buyers from advertising companies sip wine, nibble on plantain chips, and listen to yet another pitch on how they should spend their clients’ budgets. This is advertising “upfront” season in New York, and Robertson, a cast member on A+E Networks’ runaway blockbuster reality program Duck Dynasty, is one of the stars of tonight’s show.
  • The final episode of the show’s third season, which aired on the A&E channel on April 24, was watched by 9.6 million viewers, according to Nielsen (NLSN), beating everything on both cable and broadcast television that night in the 18- to 49-year-old demographic, including the NBA playoffs and Fox’s American Idol.
  • Upfront season is a festive, testy time of year when every TV network (and, these days, a handful of businesses with large, online video operations such as YouTube (GOOG) and Yahoo! (YHOO)) throws a lavish self-congratulatory party, rolls out its programming lineup for the coming season, and tries to sell ad space in advance. This past season, the proliferation of choices for consumers took a major toll on the traditional broadcast networks, which collectively lost a sizable portion of their viewing audience. “The math says that broadcast erosion is throwing over a billion dollars up for grabs in this year’s upfront,” Berning tells the ad buyers. “If you’re tired of paying a failure tax, we have lots of successful programs for you to invest in.”
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  • It’s a sales pitch that’s been working for A+E Networks, a private New York company owned by Hearst and Disney (DIS) that operates a portfolio of cable channels, including History, Lifetime, and A&E. (A+E is the name of the company; A&E is the name of the channel.) According to data from SNL Kagan, ad revenue at A&E grew from $366 million in 2008 to $477 million in 2012. During that same period, ad revenue at History grew from $310 million to $499 million. A+E Networks generates roughly $1.2 billion of profit on $3.6 billion of annual revenue, according to a network source who was not authorized to speak publicly about the company’s finances.
  • Ad buyers know that over the past year, few companies have done a better job of capturing the fragmented attention of TV viewers. A+E has thrived thanks in part to a slate of reality shows that focus on lifestyles far removed from the office-tied lives of the white-collar, urban strivers who make TV. A+E executives brag that their channels air 18 of the top 50 entertainment shows among adults on ad-supported cable. The current lineup includes Ice Road Truckers (about arctic truck drivers operating in remote, dangerous conditions), Ax Men (logging crews), Swamp People (Cajun alligator hunters), Pawn Stars (Las Vegas pawnshop owners), and American Hoggers (feral pig exterminators in Texas). History recently aired the fifth season of Top Shot, a reality competition in which contestants shoot rifles, handguns, and grenade launchers.
  • Tracy Tuten on 14 Aug 13
     
    Great article on redesign, creativity, upfronts, programming, and leadership
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