Which U.S. Factual channels are gaining or losing prime time viewers year-to-year?
Here are three highlights:
- A&E swoops into the #2 spot on our Factual network list, behind its big sister History.
- Discovery Networks has a new #3 network: ID is up 51% and knocks Animal Planet into #4.
- Nat Geo Channel has a lively pulse, read on…
METHODOLOGY
Our bucket of channels is not apples-to-apples:
- It includes channels that are dedicated to non-scripted, for example Nat Geo and Discovery.
- And others like A&E and MTV that mix Docs and Reality with Scripted.
- Some channels that schedule Factual are unrated, or were not rated last year.
- And some cases we didn’t capture the data in 2010.
Our quarterly, high-level snapshot is prepared with the assistance of John Morse, president of research firm Byron Media.
Quantity Not Quality
- Most ad-supported channels sell media based on their target demos.
- And networks rate their performance (and those of their managers) quarter-to-quarter rather than year-to-year.
- Nevertheless, our measure of the quarterly ‘average prime time’ audience is a very useful tool for gauging of relative scale of the networks as well as trends in their appeal.
DOCUMENTARYTELEVISION.COM CHART: WHO’S HOT? WHO’S NOT!
U.S. Factual Channels
Average Quarterly Prime Time Audience, 3Q’11 versus 3Q’10
(‘000)
| Viewers: |
|
|
| |
Rating 3Q11 | 3Q’11 | 3Q’10 | Change | % | |
| HISTORY | 1.5 | 1,516 | 1,291 | 225 | 17% |
| A&E | 1.2 | 1,242 | 1,172 | 70 | 6% |
| SYFY | 1.1 | 1,070 | 950 | 120 | 13% |
| MTV | 1.1 | 1,062 | 952 | 110 | 12% |
| HGTV | 1.0 | 1,001 | 1,055 | -54 | -5% |
| FOOD | 0.9 | 900 | 905 | -5 | -1% |
| DISCOVERY | 0.9 | 886 | 956 | -70 | -7% |
| TLC | 0.9 | 865 | 864 | 1 | 0% |
| TRU TV | 0.9 | 798 | 838 | -40 | -5% |
| SPIKE* | 0.7 | 704 | NA | NA | NA |
| BRAVO | 0.7 | 695 | 751 | -56 | -7% |
| BET | 0.7 | 608 | 562 | 46 | 8% |
| E! ENTERTAINMENT | 0.6 | 566 | 589 | -23 | -4% |
| VH1 | 0.5 | 484 | 348 | 136 | 39% |
| ID: INVEST. DISC. | 0.6 | 460 | 304 | 156 | 51% |
| ANIMAL PLANET | 0.4 | 429 | 431 | -2 | 0% |
| NAT GEO CHANNEL | 0.5 | 384 | 318 | 66 | 21% |
| OXYGEN | 0.4 | 337 | 384 | -47 | -12% |
| TRAVEL | 0.3 | 331 | 399 | -68 | -17% |
| WE | 0.3 | 220 | 235 | -15 | -6% |
| STYLE | 0.3 | 208 | 122 | 86 | 70% |
| SCIENCE | 0.3 | 189 | 201 | -12 | 0% |
| OWN: OPRAH* | 0.3 | 188 | NA | NA | NA |
| BIO | 0.2 | 157 | 165 | -8 | -5% |
| H2 (HISTORY INTL) | 0.2 | 155 | 166 | -11 | -7% |
| MILITARY | 0.2 | 129 | 121 | 8 | 7% |
| PL GREEN / DISC TRAVEL* | 0.2 | 111 | NA | NA | NA |
| NAT GEO WILD | 0.2 | 98 | 88 | 10 | 11% |
| DISC FIT HEALTH* | 0.2 | 89 | NA | NA | NA |
| DIY* | 0.1 | 80 | NA | NA | NA |
| CURRENT* | 0.1 | 63 | NA | NA | NA |
| VELOCITY* | 0.1 | 56 | NA | NA | NA |
| OVATION* | 0.1 | 39 | NA | NA | NA |
*Data not available or channel rebrands
Source: Nielsen Media Research
HIGHLIGHTS
Largest audience (‘000)
- History (1,516), A&E (1,242), SYFY (1,070), MTV (1,062), HGTV (1,001)
- MTV replaced the In-and-Out Discovery in our Top 5
Growth (%)
- Top 5: Style (70% – what’s going on there?), ID: Investigation Discovery (51%), VH1 (39%), Nat Geo Channel (21%) and History (17%)
- Audience losers were Oxygen (-12%), Bravo (-7%), Discovery (-7%), the newly branded H2 (-7%) and We (-6%)
Oprah’s OWN: You’ve read this before…
- Discovery has spent upwards of $200 million
- What for?
- OWN’s average audience is only .1 higher than the ‘under-performing’ Discovery Health network it replaced.
- And Health was for years kept alive on a drip feed of stale library product!
- How much more time will Discovery give Oprah and OWN? What’s the solution?
The Factual Tide Keeps Rising
- The broad Unscripted category continues to grow at the expense of Scripted, News and other categories
- The year-to-year increase for DocumentaryTelevision.com’s bucket of Basic factual channels was 4%, but down from 9% in our last sample
TAKEAWAYS
- History’s 228,000 new viewers hammers home the message: “We’re in a competitive class all of our own!”
- But isn’t it time for History to share more of its Eureka! scale profits with its work-for-hire production teams?
- A&E’s leap into the #2 spot underlines A+E Networks’ dominance of the Factual category.
- ID (460/+51%) shot past a hibernating Animal Planet (429/0%)
- The Law & Order franchise isn’t Factual, but maybe it’s a beacon for how high Discovery’s Crime-dedicated channel can aim?
- The diminutive Nat Geo Channel (only 380) gains viewers (21%) as a new management team focuses on what American cable TV viewers like.
- Nat Geo is leaving its ‘Yellow Borders heritage’ in the rearview mirror.
AND BTW
Some other channels…
3Q’11 | ||
Rating | Viewer | |
| USA | 2.7 | 2,656 |
| LIFETIME | 1.0 | 961 |
| WEATHER | 0.3 | 268 |
| IFC | 0.2 | 121 |
| LOGO | 0.1 | 40 |
| MSNBC | 0.7 | 624 |
| HBO (Pay) | 3.7 | 1,126 |
Would be interesting to add pbs and the premium channels showtime and HBO and espn to this mix – consumers are paying for all of it how do the premies stack up ?