NEW YORK: Only NBC had a larger prime-time audience during the first week in June, according to Wachovia’s weekly “Who’s Watching” report. NBC was up by 9 percent among all households for the week ending June 7 compared to the same period last year. All other factors were down, including the break-out 18-49 age group for weekly prime time, and for both demos season-to-date. The rest of the big four fell in the weekly metric; CBS maintained a larger audience than last year season-to-date.
Wachovia’s ad market update: “Still no deals in the upfront and the gap bet. Buyers and seller expectations appear to be significant--this should drag on for a while. We still think network TV volumes will be down in the double digits, with low single digit declines in CPMs, while we expect cable volumes and CPMs to be somewhat stronger.”
Wachovia’s report tracks the weekly (ending June 7) and season-to-date (STD), year-to-year change in average households data for broadcast (live plus same day) and audience data for cable nets (live plus same day): STD is prime time (PT) unless otherwise noted, e.g., Food and HGTV.
-- Disney (ABC): Prime-time average household (HH) rating was -4 percent for total HHs and +7 percent for P18-49. Season-to-date average audience was -7 percent for both.
-- CBS (CBS): PT avg. HH rating was -4 percent for total HHs and -6 percent for P18-49. STD avg. audience was +8 percent and +4 percent, respectively.
-- News Corp (FOX): PT avg. HH rating was -19 percent for total HHs and -26 percent for P18-49. STD avg. audience was -15 percent and -18 percent, respectively.
-- GE (NBC): PT avg. HH rating was +9 percent for total HHs and -5 percent for P18-49. STD avg. audience was -8 percent and -4 percent, respectively.
-- Viacom:
BET PT avg. audience was +40 percent for P2+ and +55 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was +16 percent for P2+ and +18 percent for P25-54.
Comedy Central PT avg. audience was -25 percent for P2+ and -23 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was +0 percent and -2 percent, respectively.
MTV PT avg. audience was -14 percent for P2+ and -5 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was -23 percent and -13 percent, respectively.
VH1 PT avg. audience was +26 percent for P2+ and +19 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was -5 percent and -3 percent, respectively.
Nickelodeon PT avg. audience was -4 percent for P2+ and -1 percent for P2-11. STD avg. audience was +8 percent and +8 percent, respectively.
-- Discovery:
Discovery Channel PT avg. audience was +10 percent for P2+ and +6 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was +5 percent and +5 percent, respectively.
The Learning Channel PT avg. audience was +73 percent for P2+ and +64 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was +8 percent and +1 percent, respectively.
Animal Planet PT avg. audience was +3 percent for P2+ and +30 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was +8 percent and +16 percent, respectively.
-- Scripps:
HGTV PT avg. audience was +12 percent for P2+ and +4 percent for P25-54. STD PT avg. audience was +2 percent and -1 percent, respectively. STD total day avg. audience was -2 percent for P2+ and -1 percent for P25-54.
Food Netnetwork PT avg. audience was +18 percent for P2+ and +20 percent for P25-54. STD PT avg. audience was +15 percent for P2+ and +14 percent for P25-54. STD total day avg. audience was +8 percent for P2+ and +6 percent for P25-54.
-- Disney:
ESPN PT avg. audience was +2 percent for P2+ and +8 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was +1 percent for both.
Disney Channel PT avg. audience was +5 percent for P2+ and +12 percent for P2-11. STD avg. audience was -8 percent for P2+ and -7 percent for P2-11.
-- News Corp.:
Fox News Channel PT avg. audience was +24 percent for P2+ and +37 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was +45 percent and +51 percent respectively.
F/X PT avg. audience was +39 percent for P2+ and +31 percent for P25-54. STD avg. audience was +4 percent for P2+ and +5 percent for P25-54.
National Geographic PT avg. audience was flat for P2+ and for P25-54. STD avg. audience was +12 percent and +9 percent, respectively.
