Mad Ave. loves Bravo's subs
Ratings low but audience growing
That's the good news.
Not so good is the low overall Nielsen ratings Bravo gets -- a minuscule 0.25 primetime rating in cable homes for 1998, putting it 35th overall out of the 37 ad-supported networks tracked by Nielsen.
But Ed Carroll, executive VP and G.M. of Bravo and its sister network IFC (Independent Film Channel), quoting Nielsen figures, says Bravo is pulling in new subscribers at a brisk pace, adding 8 million customers just in the past year, a 25% increase. That means that although its 0.25 primetime rating in 1998 is 4% below the 0.26 of a year ago, the average number of households watching Bravo jumped by 20% year to year, from 68,200 to 82,000. As of December 1998, Bravo was available to 36.8 million homes, according to Nielsen.
Mass audiences are not going to flock to a network with programs like "Kiri Te Kanawa: Opera in the Outback" and "Bravo Profiles: Salvador Dali." "Our ratings are not going to topple Monday night wrestling on USA," Carroll says.
Selected viewers
But the audience that does tune in to Bravo is choice. Mediamark Research Inc. reports that the average viewer of these Bravo primetime shows earns $58,082 a year, which is higher than any other cable network in the U.S. by more than $3,000. (The average viewer of second-place CNBC pockets $54,873 a year.)
Nielsen Media Research says that from October 1997 to September 1998, Bravo finished No. 1 in viewers per household among professional or managerial adults, people with college degrees and among men and women making $75,000 a year or more, among other desired demographic categories.
Although Bravo began selling spots only three months ago, Carroll says the channel has lured as regular advertisers such companies as Mercedes-Benz, DeBeers jewelry, American Century Investment, Lexus, MCI, American Express, IBM, Ferrero Roche and Federal Express.
"We want blue-chip advertisers," Carroll says. "We charge a premium for our advertising, which means we'll end up walking away from business."
Bravo is off to a deliberately slow start in filling its commercial breaks with ads, Carroll says, because the network did not make a presentation during last spring's upfront selling season, when it was still formulating its blueprint to abandon a long-standing commercial-free strategy. "We'll be highly visible next spring during the upfront," Carroll says, planning a multimillion-dollar campaign on the theme "Bravo reaches TV's most desirable audience."
