The Tribune

By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

Cable networks “need mass” to continue to produce quality content “a-la-carte" because the associated costs are extremely expensive, industry executives said yesterday.

Rori Peters, senior vice-president for content distribution and sales strategy for the US-based cable channel, TV One, told a Zoom conference that providing content that can be accessed separately - rather than as a bundled package - is a function of obtaining rights for particular programming.

While her network may acquire a particular television programme, it may not have the rights to air the content in every market where TV One has a presence, which may lead to some “blacking out".

“A lot of people don't want their content to be made available as a one-off, they want to be a part of a package," Ms Peters said. "Quite honestly, economically, it is pretty much the only way that most networks could continue to produce quality content.”

Giving consumers an “a-la-carte” option would substantially increase the cost of cable packages because it would be harder for providers to bundle those individual channels and networks together into one. Customers increasingly want to pick and choose which channels they want rather than giving them a set package based on demographic.

Ms Peters said TV networks “need mass in order to have the revenue to produce those shows. They're extremely expensive, and so as much as consumers have thought that they would like a-la-carte- ,I think it's because they don’t know what the implications would be. The quality and the amount of content would not be anywhere near the same".

She added that content distributors, such as cable companies, are now trying to respond to these need by creating products that have “few but targeted content” so consumers can get what they want and throw out what they do not.

David Burrows, Cable Bahamas’ marketing manager, added: “Our customers may wish to have a-la-carte, but the reality is if we wanted to make TV One another a-la-carte option that channel could cost $5, $6 or $10 for that individual channel, because they are relying on mass. They're relying on a number of people buying into the same package.

"So we have to look at what the customer is actually watching, and that’s what we’ve been very good at over the past five or six years; really getting a real understanding of what is it that you want to see and what do you need to see.

"We talk about sports. Sports is very expensive. I would say that ESPN and ESPN2 are the most expensive channels that we have on our entire network. Because they have to go out and negotiate with every single one of the basketball teams, the baseball teams, the football teams, and so forth. So there's a lot that goes into building a package, a tremendous amount of market study.”