We thought we’d end the year with a brief round up of
important events that took place that have potentially significant impact on
the African American media and marketing ecosystem.
Just as 2017 was beginning to wind down, at least three major
events took place that potentially have enormous implications for the African
American marketing ecosystem.
The Future of Essence?
On Monday, November 27th, Meredith, publishers of
a host of general market heartland publications such as Better Homes &
Gardens and Family Circle announced it was purchasing Time, Inc. for 1.8
billion in cash. Ordinarily, this
wouldn’t cause anyone to blink, except, one of the titles in the Time, Inc.
portfolio is Essence Communications.
Essence Communications of course is the publisher of Essence magazine,
the primary magazine for Black women and the trailblazing Essence
Festival.
There has been a lot of discussion about which titles might
be shuttered when Meredith takes over, but in none of the public discussions
has the status or fate of Essence even been mentioned. That’s because according to Essence sources,
Essence is outside of the Meredith purchase.
However, the magazine is still on the block which leaves the very
critical question, who is looking to purchase it and how long can it remain on
the block without a suitor?
In July 2017, CEO Rich Battista was quoted in WWD that Time
Inc. “was looking for someone to purchase a majority share in Essence
magazine.” “We want to unlock the value here.
We think the best way to do that is to bring in a strategic partner with
investment capital. We’re keeping an
interest because we see real upside.”
The ideal scenario, of course, would be for Essence to
return to being Black owned. If not
black owned, then at the very least, a company or investors that understand the
tremendous service and value Essence delivers to its audience.
It has always been expected within the circle of African
American agency and media executives that Time
would not keep Essence for long. After completing the full purchase in 2005, it
was predicted that Essence would remain part of the Time, Inc. family for maybe
5 years. Clearly, those of us who made
that prediction were wrong, and happy to be so.
Essence managed to stay apart of the Time Inc portfolio for 7 going on 8
years past that prediction.
The impending demise of Time, Inc. is due in large part to
it’s not reading the tea leaves about the digital landscape and keeping pace
with not only the marketplace but consumers.
Essence is the only Time Inc. title that kept its finger on the pulse of
its audience and tried to keep up, with no help, I might add, from Time
Inc.
We can thank the #Blackgirlmagic of Michelle Ebanks and the lean
editorial and sales teams in New York, Chicago and LA that work hard to keep
readers and clients engaged with little support.
Tea Leaves will
keep an eye on this as it continues to unfold.
The African American community cannot afford to lose another important
media channel.
In case you didn’t know, Essence Communications was founded
in 1968 by Edward Lewis, Clarence O. Smith, Cecil Hollingsworth and Jonathan
Blount. The first issue of Essence Magazine was published in May 1970. In 2000, Time Warner purchased 49% of
Essence Communications and reserved the opportunity to purchase the remaining
shares if they became available. In 2005,
Time Warner purchased the remaining 51% of Essence Communications.
Discovery Increases Ownership in OWN; Purchases Additional 25%
Stake
Discovery Communications, Inc. took majority ownership of Oprah
Winfrey’s cable network, OWN, by increasing its 50% stake by an additional 24.5%. Winfrey will retain 25.5% ownership of the
network and will remain CEO until 2025.
What is significant about this?
OWN launched in 2011 and had it’s initial struggles like any
network would. However, since then, through lots of trials and test runs, and
partnering with Tyler Perry, Ava DuVernay and other Black program creators and
producers, OWN has emerged as the leading network for African American
women.
Partnering with Tyler Perry and leveraging his following put
the network in the black, literally.
The network has now developed a track record for producing
and delivering a handful of high quality and well written scripted series that
now represent 3 of the top 10 programs on ad supported cable based on Nielsen
data for total viewers; The Haves and Have Nots, Greenleaf, Queen Sugar.
While low rated compared to Empire, for instance, the
programs on OWN demonstrate that African American women viewers have a wider
preference in programming than the unflattering representations of reality
television. Of course, OWN is not
without its contribution to ridiculous television either. But at least it’s counter-balanced with
intelligent fare.
Discovery’s increased stake now makes OWN the third television
network targeted to African Americans that is majority owned by a white
corporation; BET and Centric (Viacom), Bounce (Scripps). Only BET and OWN have African American
executives leading their respective ventures.
It also means that three of the most important media brands
programming to African American audiences (Essence, BET and OWN) are not really
controlled by people vested in the accurate and uplifting telling of our
stories.
TV One Cancels Roland Martin’s Daily Morning Show
On December 6th, TV One announced it was
cancelling the daily morning news and information show News One Now with Roland
Martin due to budget cuts.
This budget cutting measure underscores the tenuous
predicament of black media. Arguably the
most important show on television as the only news and information show
specifically targeted to African American audiences, its existence was not
influenced or swayed by the unique importance the show had. At a time when our community is under siege from
a number of fronts, we could count on Roland to ask the hard questions and dig
deep to help us understand the real issues and put it in a context for everyday
people to absorb. No other program, no
matter how committed they claim to be to justice and fairness can deliver on
that the way Roland Martin can. The
community is now left unguarded and even more vulnerable.
Morning radio host Tom Joyner put it this way after calling
for a boycott of the network, “It always
comes down to money. All of television is suffering now, but to heal the many
issues by sacrificing your community is not the answer.”
Couldn’t agree with you more Tom, but the network’s carefully worded statement telegraphed the real issue: “Despite the network’s commitment and investment, NewsOne Now did not gain traction with advertisers and viewers. . . .”
Couldn’t agree with you more Tom, but the network’s carefully worded statement telegraphed the real issue: “Despite the network’s commitment and investment, NewsOne Now did not gain traction with advertisers and viewers. . . .”
Notice who is listed first as the program not gaining
traction with. Programs like this are
never ratings juggernauts, but that doesn’t make them less important. But African American television viewers carry
some blame here too. Twenty times more
people watch Empire than watch News One Now.
Rupert Murdoch and 20th Century Fox are so thrilled about that,
they produced another show to accompany Empire and are skipping double time all
the way to the bank.
What you watch matters.
It has an economic ripple effect.
Surely you don’t think the networks that are airing Real Housewives and
Love and Hip Hop are doing so because they have your best interests at
heart. They do it because they know you
will turn it on and Tweet about it, social chat about it and all of that
interaction is tantamount to the cash register ringing. Black folks’ guilty pleasure is making white
owned media rich as all get out while Black media is literally dying on the
vine. That’s another post.
All of this makes for a rather murky 2018 landscape for Black media especially given that the world's number one advertiser has declared that African American audiences are extremely important to them and they will be relying on the dedicated media that serves this consumer to revitalize their eroding market share. Media Tea Leaves will take a deeper dive into this in an upcoming post..
Until next post, Happy New Year to you and yours. May 2018 bring you all of the success, love, joy and laughter you can receive and more.
Good info Deborah. That's for being our eyes and ears.
ReplyDeleteDeborah, Its Good to hear your voice. Question: what does your research tell us about the allocation of dollars for AA Programing on networks like OWN or for indy's like me here at BadamiTV in first run syndication, including the producing of AA commercials? GoodThoughts, Frank Badami
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