How do channels commission new factual programs?
PIN-POINTING THE GREEN LIGHTS Where can you find the suppliers to U.S. Factual networks? New York? LA? London? Are there other centers of development and production? Are there different sourcing practices amongst: Established channels and digi-nets? Documentary and Reality channels? These questions matter: For networks: Where should you locate LBA, Development and other resources? For producers: …
OWN The Oprah Winfrey Network announced the acquisition of three documentary films for Oprah’s Documentary Film Club One Lucky Elephant follows circus producer David Balding as he struggles to find a nurturing home for his beloved orphaned baby African elephant. The film was ten years in the making 65 Redroses captures the spirit of a …
Oprah’s Documentary Club Picks Three More: How Many Slots Left? What are they Paying? Read More »
Sheffield Doc/Fest Session What Do U.S. Broadcasters Want? How Much Do They Pay? Who? When? 2/3 U.S. channels spend more than $2.0 billion / year on Factual productions. But how can producers get a sliver of that huge pie? They need useful tools to analyse the channels and then to pitch the ideas that networks are …
The Doc/Fest Session U.S. channels are spending more than $2.0 billion this year on factual productions. But how can producers get a sliver of that huge pie? They need useful tools to analyse the channels and then to pitch the programmes that networks are most likely to buy. This session focuses on the ‘business of …
Our ESPN Tour: Touchdown in Bristol! On Tuesday, ESPN’s senior technology team kindly conducted us on a tour of their astounding Bristol CT facility. Our client: Turkey’s Samanyolu Broadcasting Media Group, and its U.S. affiliate EBRU. What did we learn? We write a lot here about ‘scale’ Scale really matters in business … and its leverage leaps out at you in …
In this week’s DocumentaryTelevision.com – we continue our detailed profile of Hoff Productions’ path from freelancer to a leading supplier to U.S. factual channels, including Discovery and NGC. The story so far: Michael Hoff begins from a base in a spare room. He develops a respectable client list for Hoff Productions. But catastrophe always lurks around the …
A Preferred Producer: Hoff Productions between Basement and Buyout (Part 2/2) Read More »
The scale of factual producers ranges from basement operators to ‘Super-preferred Producers’ like Pilgrim Entertainment. We continue our case studies of the U.S. production sector by focusing on Hoff Productions, which represents the tier below the ‘Super’ category. Hoff Productions is based in the Bay Area, with a recently opened office in New York, and is …
A Preferred Producer: Hoff Productions between Basement and Buyout (Part 1/2) Read More »
Commissions Factual? U.S. TVHH Genre TBS 100,608 Entertainment CNN / HLN 100,370 News Yes DISCOVERY CHANNEL 100,101 Factual/Reality Yes NICK-AT-NITE 100,064 Entertainment NICKELODEON 100,064 Kids THE WEATHER CHANNEL 100,054 News Yes FOOD NETWORK 99,934 Lifestyle Yes CNN CABLE NEWS NETWORK 99,640 News Yes TNT 99,630 Entertainment …
U.S. Cable Networks: Which Ones Commission Factual? How Many Homes Do They Reach? Read More »