WHY THIS MATTERS
Nets always want to put their best foot forward for advertisers, and beating the upfront rush is considered by some a way to do that.
The 2014-15 Upfront season is scheduled to blossom on March 4, according to the Weather Channel's current forecast. Weather Channel's parent, The Weather Co., is holding its presentation for advertisers early because it has a multifaceted pitch to make and doesn't want to get lost in the shuffle. Last year, the company held an upfront for its TV network and participated in the NewFronts for its digital products. This coming year, The Weather Co. will combine both into a single event that it's calling an AllFront.
At this point it appears, based on the calendar kept by the Cabletelevision Advertising Bureau, that the Weather Channel's March shindig will launch the upfront season, a series of events ranging from serious presentations to parties with music and drink, all designed to persuade media buyers and their clients where to spend their marketing dollars. The early CAB calendar already lists 21 events. While the networks also meet one-on-one with clients and agency planners and buyers, a memorable event is a good way to make an impression.
Generally, cable networks go first and lead up to the broadcasters' upfronts week in May. In the last few years, however, that week has been infiltrated by cablers Turner Broadcasting and ESPN and punctuated by USA Network.
In 2013, there were four upfront events scheduled for February, months before most ad sales deals are negotiated in June. It is possible that networks will still hold events in February. Three of the four events held that month last year were thrown by NBCUniversal networks. At this point, only one of NBCU's entertainment networks appears on the CAB calendar. An NBCU representative had no comment on the upfront plans of networks including USA, E!, Oxygen and Esquire. Syfy wants buyers to hold the date of March 25.
Under ad sales president Linda Yaccarino, NBCU has been pushing a portfolio sell to convince clients and buyers they can reach customers by using a combination of NBCU's broadcast, cable and digital assets. Earlier this year, the group reorganized its sales force into bundles of networks based on their programming.
NBCU could opt to hold an event at which all its brands would be represented or continue to have events for each network to reinforce their assets and give buyers and clients an opportunity to hear about their plans from their senior executives. Last year, NBCU CEO Steve Burke gamely attended nearly all of his networks' events for ad buyers, but he would probably prefer to make fewer public appearances.
Looking to Shine
Weather Channel, on the other hand, wants its place in the sun. The Weather Co. has been investing in data and analytics to show how the weather affects its clients' business, whether they are in fast food, retail or pharmaceuticals. We wanted to go so early because it's a pretty comprehensive message that we're doing, says Chris Raleigh, Weather Co. senior VP of cable and cross-platform ad sales.
After doing a separate upfront and NewFront last year, feedback from most clients and agencies was that they didn't want to sit through two presentations from a single media company.
Weather will also be reviewing the TV network's new programming, including the way it offers a local forecast via a crawl, which means viewers don't have to wait for local weather on the eights every 10 minutes. Since the new format was launched last month, Raleigh says length of tune-in is up, which is good for both the network and its sponsors.
While some networks are consistent regarding whether or not to hold a big upfront presentation, others change plans year to year. For example, Reelz Network, which wasn't on the CAB calendar in 2013, has set April 9 as its date for an upfront event.
On the other hand, FX Networks, which held a major presentation last year to introduce media buyers to its new suite of channels- FX, FXX, FXM-is likely to return to its strategy of holding individual meetings with agency buyers and clients. Next year, a big part of the FX message will be selling The Simpsons, slated to appear on cable for the first time on FXX starting in fall 2014.
FX is likely to continue its tradition of holding an upfront bowling party where media buyers can mix with the stars of its original shows. Homer Simpson might not be on hand, but surely he would approve.
WHY THIS MATTERS
Nets always want to put their best foot forward for advertisers, and beating the upfront rush is considered by some a way to do that.
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
WHY THIS MATTERS
