TV advertising this fall is shaping up to be the most unique marketplace networks have faced. On one side, advertisers are pointing to the glut of programming planned for September, October and November, and expecting prices to drop with so many high-profile sports competing against each other. On the other side, networks are saying that the lack of top entertainment programming gives advertisers few non-sports options. “That’s what slowed the market down for a while,” said NBC Sports Exec VP/Ad Sales Dan Lovinger. “Overall, people are seeing that there’s an orderly future to the marketplace.” Lovinger said TV advertising’s scatter market has been strong in Q2 and Q3. “What that tells us is that in the supply and demand equation, the pricing is going up, which is surprising given what you read in the press and see on television about this pandemic,” he said. NBC has been “steadily moving” its NFL inventory, Lovinger said. Most of the advertisers who put their PGA Tour and NHL schedules on pause have returned, he said. “We feel very good about the market,” he said. “In the sports marketplace, as everything went away, a lot of the cash that we had booked was put on pause. That money is mostly still there and being restarted. ... There are a handful that are saying the seasonality is different. They have different marketing objectives in the fall than they did in the spring, so they are not going to be there” (John Ourand, SBJ Media).
CONCERN FOR MLB: AXIOS' Sara Fischer cites iSpotTV data as showing that networks and pay TV providers could be "in a position to lose" as much as $587M in TV ad dollars if the MLB season was canceled. Baseball is "one of the most lucrative professional sports franchises globally." Its media rights alone cost nearly $3.6B. For regional and local broadcasters, the losses "would be devastating." The rights for those networks were worth a combined $1.8B last season (AXIOS, 7/28). Douglas Alexandra Agency CEO Shelley Willingham said advertisers are “definitely” concerned over whether MLB can finish its season. Willingham: “I look at a lot of the major advertisers that had a lot of their TV ad spending in MLB, and you take Anheuser-Busch for instance, even before this recent outbreak they made the decision in late March to reallocate their TV ad spend to their nonprofit partners to help support COVID relief efforts" (“Squawk on the Street,” CNBC, 7/28).
