Broadcast TV's Scatter Market Is Up ... So Far

Usually, there’s there’s some separation between the upfront market for TV ad sales and the scatter market, which moves closer to airtime, but not in this year-to-end-all-years. So, since the upfront drifted throughout the summer and into the fall, it’s already time to assess the scatter market, and the media trades are reporting this: that so far, the broadcast networks’ decisions to hold back inventory for scatter — on the bet that they could charge higher prices as the economy improved — seems to be paying off, so far.

Mediaweek is reporting that scatter rates are up by as much as 8 percent over the upfront — upfront rates were down by as much as 7 percent from a year earlier, so, as all good news is relative this year, that is good. Mediapost has a slightly different take — that rates are up by one to three percent for what it qualified as “most of the bigger broadcast networks.” The cable nets, which have managed to sidestep most of the advertising recession, are up by more than broadcast.

The biggest question in the marketplace seems to be whether this sudden flurry of business will continue, especially when the economic news wavers almost daily between getting better and not getting better at all.  On the other hand, there doesn’t seem to be the ratings drop off thus far this year that there was last year, which could have had a deleterious effect on scatter independent of the economy. It’s a wait-and-see game, but so far, for the sellers, it’s looking pretty good.