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posted June 26, 2003 06:08 PM
Speed TV Pres. interview by Dean Adams
Interview: Speed TV Network President Jim Libratore
by dean adams
Jim Libratore is the President of the Speed Network. I interviewed him yesterday afternoon.
(© Dean Adams, All Rights Reserved)
Q. What exactly is happening in regards to motorcycle programming on Speed?
A. When we stared the network, there were no Nielson over-night ratings for Speedvision. So, when we put the network together, we thought the way to go would be to put racing in prime (time) Monday through Sunday, whether it was live or a repeat. Monday was Winston Cup, Tuesday was motorcycle, Wednesday and Thursday were open wheel and rally, etc. you get the picture.
What we came to learn when we started getting over-nights, is that the NASCAR stuff was performing, a lot of the automotive magazine shows were performing very well, and a lot of the racing was doing well, but the repeats for everything were doing poorly. And unfortunately for us, we had put (them) all in prime time. We based our whole schedule on racing.
So, what we're doing now is taking some of the stuff that is performing well--magazine shows, Dave Despain's show, and we're putting them into prime time, and we're reducing the amount of repeat plays of races. Which includes motorcycles and the Winston Cup, trucks, etc, all are being cut down.
Unfortunately for the motorcycle guys, there were more replays because Two Wheel Tuesday was filled up with motorcycle programming. So, some nights there was as much as nine hours of re-played racing on Tuesday. Thus, the idea of cutting back replays affects motorcycles the most. But, on top of that, Tuesday was, by far, the lowest rated night of the week we had. It regularly did point zero something (for the Neilson rating), and in prime-time, that's just not going to work.
So, what we first tried to do was bring in Greg's Garage and promote Two Wheel Tuesday more and try to make it a little more interesting; if you've noticed, we were bringing riders in and things like that. We tried to dress it up a little more, gave away the motorcycle and had the sweepstakes for jackets. But the ratings just went nowhere.
What we found was happening was that there was about 100,000 households that would watch us on Tuesday night. And what we think happened was that a majority of our audience would think 'It's Tuesday, that's motorcycle night on Speed' and if you're not into motorcycles, you won't turn on the channel. So, Tuesday, all day, was bad for us.
Now what we're trying to do, in addition to cutting down the replays, is that we want different people coming to the network for different reasons--every night. So, you could be a motorcycle guy on Tuesday night and you'll have something to watch. But Despain's show was going to attract a different audience, the auto magazine show will attract a different viewer. And then NASCAR is, theoretically, a different (viewer). So, now on any night of the week you'll have NASCAR, auto enthusiast racing, non-auto racing fans, motorcycle racing and non-racing fans coming to the channel and sampling what other things we may have on.
The bottom line from a business standpoint is that our all-day rating just isn't good enough, it's not high enough. What's happening now is that when you get into the affiliate world, these people are like, 'Okay, what am I paying for? How many of my Comcast or Time Warner subscribers are actually watching the network in a given week?'. And that number has to come up. And that number does not even count the ad sales equation.
So, our move was not a motorcycle thing, it was an overall network move that affects motorcycles the most.
Q. Would you agree with the assessment that Speed was once a racing enthusiast channel and now it's a car racing channel that offers some motorcycle racing in between car shows?
No, I would not. Because I would ask you the same thing that I ask everybody: what was on Speedvison that you don't get now on Speed channel? The answers are Lost Drive-In, and there's some aviation programming that is gone. That is true. But, essentially, it's the same now.
What we've found in programming is that the passionate love affair people had with Speedvison was because it was a haven away from NASCAR. Now, it's not. But, you have to look at what it is. For instance, since the Speedvison take-over, we have added CART, F-3000, F-1 Decade, more World Rally ... there's a huge list of new programming. We've really removed nothing. We're not re-playing things 30,40,50 times in the course of a three month period any more. And, we added a bunch of NASCAR.
The NASCAR stuff that people hate is like this: we view Winston Cup, Trucks and Busch as separate series. Non-NASCAR fans view it all as "NASCAR" and it appears like there is tons of it. The other issue with NASCAR is that the season runs 40 weeks. F-1 and Cart and these other series run 16-18 weeks.
The environment has changed since the addition of NASCAR. But, everything is still there, it's just there now with a lot of NASCAR programming. That's kind of the major gripe.
So, what we're going to do now is to develop, whether it's one-offs or what have you, more and better motorcycle programming. We're definitely not abandoning it. Quite the opposite, really. If we could get into some of the other series that are on ESPN, we'd love to have them. We'll go after them, no doubt, when the time comes. Also, we want to start investigating some of the lifestyle stuff as well.
Q. Could you clear up a few things that I'm unclear on?
A. Sure.
Q. In regards to World Superbike and Grand Prix motorcycle racing, do the sanctioning bodies buy time on Speed and air their programming, or do you buy the programming, or is it an ad-split? How does that work?
A. I'm not going to get into specific details of that. Every deal is a little bit different, some are time-buys, some we buy, everything is different.
But, what I would say is that World Superbike and Grand Prix perform well, and we really like what's happening on Sunday, obviously. It's really just the repeats that are killing us. We've gotten to a point where repeats don't really perform in prime time. And as hard as it is going to be, people need to appreciate that we're running a business. I had one guy who told me that we should open this up to a vote. We should let people vote on what they want to watch. But ... people do vote. And they're called over-night ratings.
I look at this as a reduction of repeats, and the motorcycle guys are looking at it as a reduction of motorcycle programming. If you look at it, it's just the repeats that are changing.
What we're trying to do with our two-hour block for Two Wheel Tuesday is that we're going to try and make it a lot better. It'll be highlights from the races, more commentary, more guests as we try to make it a better two hour block. Corbin's Ride On and American Thunder, those all do great. It's just that the racing repeats do not do well.
We have found that our motorcycle magazine shows would do .2 or .3 in the (Neilson) ratings, then as soon as the motorcycle racing came on, it would drop to a .0 something.
Q. How long have you had access to ratings data? Have the motorcycle racing ratings always been bad? Have they been better?
A. No, we've had them for over a year now, and Tuesday has been the lowest rated night of the week. I hate to say that it has anything to do with motorcycles. It's more because there wasn't compelling repeat programming.
Q. How about the original broadcast of a race?
A. They do fine.
Q. Is it growing?
A. It's in the point three range, which is good. Good enough for us, anyway. But it's a good audience and we feel like we need to serve that audience. And what we, ... more so than anything ... when we came in, we didn't change Two Wheel Tuesday that much. We actually tried to make it better, we've done things to try and get the ratings up. But what we're finding is that there is just a small group of people who like to watch the replays of the races.
Q. There's a lot of promotion of the NASCAR races on the motorcycle programming. Do you foresee a point when the motorcycle programming gets more promotion, or equal promotion, on the NASCAR shows? A little lead in by the hosts or an exciting film clip might help a lot.
A. We haven't done a good enough job with that, and that's hopefully what this schedule is going to hopefully promote. What I'm saying is that if you are watching Dave Despain, and you never normally watch motorcycle programming, but Dave has a rider or some personality on his show, maybe you'll say, 'Hey, this is interesting' and you watch it. Then maybe you will start growing a bigger audience.
We need to see more people coming to see the motorcycle programming, we need more than just the motorcycle guys coming. Like I said, on Sundays, that's fine. But on Tuesday's, it just does not work. There's not enough people.
Q. How about you. Are you a motorcycle guy? Do you ride? Do you watch the races?
A. No, and this is going to seem odd and completely contrary to everything I have just said, but some of the most exciting racing we've had on the network, I think, is the motorcycle racing. I love it! The passing and the amazing riding and things like that just floor me. And I didn't watch it on Sundays, I watched it on Tuesdays.
It was all-good, but in the end, it comes down to how many people were watching the repeats.
____________
Enjoy the ride!
02' ZRX1200
00' ZX12R sold
  
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posted June 26, 2003 06:41 PM
