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CBS Hasn’t Closed Door to Original Late-Night Programming

Keep in mind the person saying this is George Cheeks, who has to put the best possible face on this.

The main thing I get from this is if they do another original late night show, there won't be a music element to it.
 
From that article:
Various options are said to be on the table, ranging from giving the time period back to the network’s affiliates, to airing repeats of primetime dramas, to new, less expensive-to-produce original late-night programming.
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So which option is the most likely? I don't see how they're going to come up with original programming that is less expensive and that will also be competitive, so my bet is that they either go with the repeats from primetime or just give the time back to their affiliates.
 
TexasTom said:
they either go with the repeats from primetime or just give the time back to their affiliates.
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Would you willingly give away about $75 million? Because that's what giving the time back to affiliates means.

As long as there's still money to be made, why would they give the time for free to someone else? Byron Allen still sees value in it.
 
TheBigA said:
Would you willingly give away about $75 million? Because that's what giving the time back to affiliates means.

As long as there's still money to be made, why would they give the time for free to someone else? Byron Allen still sees value in it.
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But they said they were losing money with Colbert (their words, not mine.) His ratings were #1 in the timeslot.
 
tall_guy1 said:
But they said they were losing money with Colbert (their words, not mine.) His ratings were #1 in the timeslot.
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The cost of the show exceeded the revenue potential.
 
davideduardo said:
The cost of the show exceeded the revenue potential.
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I don't see how there's revenue potential in anyone else, either then. They could have cut costs with Colbert. Any other host wouldn't work, because late night is declining and CBS/Skydance has a very bad reputation among the general public these days.
 
TheBigA said:
Would you willingly give away about $75 million? Because that's what giving the time back to affiliates means.

As long as there's still money to be made, why would they give the time for free to someone else? Byron Allen still sees value in it.
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So far as I'm aware, the price that Byron Allen is paying CBS for the 11:35PM ET time slot has not been revealed -- but I'd be surprised if is that much. That would work out to almost $300,000 per hour.

It's been reported that Colbert's show cost $100 million/year to produce, and CBS claims it was losing $40 million -- which implies that revenue from the time slot was $60 million/year. And that's revenue for the top-rated show on late night television. Put in something cheaper with lower ratings, and that number goes down, probably by quite a bit.

So it seems unlikely that there is any path by which CBS is going to generate close to $75 million out of that time slot.
 
TheBigA said:
But I was responding to the idea of CBS just giving the time back to the affiliates. Even $60 million is a lot to give away.
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But it isn't even $60 million -- that's the revenue that CBS supposedly makes with Colbert's show. That number is going to drop (probably by a lot) when he is replaced by less expensive programming. And that programming still isn't going to be free.

So let's say that CBS just starts rerunning prime-time dramas in late night, and that generates $30 million in revenue (half what Colbert is making for them, which might still be optimistic) and that the rights for those additional broadcasts cost $20 million. Now we're talking about $10 million in profit, and that is far from assured.

Now consider the alternative, which is turning the time back to local affiliates -- many of which are owned by CBS. The obvious thing to do is to expand the local late news to an hour, probably followed by syndicated junk. Ignoring the syndicated junk, what is the advertising revenue that CBS O&Os can make from another 25 minutes of late news? I wouldn't be surprised if it is more than the network can make from national late night programming.

Now this is all speculative, of course -- but the point is that the late night revenue that CBS would give up by abandoning that hour is probably pretty low (and shrinking), and there is money to be made by giving the time back to their O&Ss.
 


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