When I was in Houston, I talked to a guy that managed several TV stations. I'm thinking they were LPTVs and I don't think they were carried by local cable systems. At least two of the stations were leased to two clients. One to an attorney that did two thirty minute infomercials each month and repeated hourly 24/7. The other leased to a car dealer that did two 60 minute programs a month repeating each one 12 times a day. Maybe they had some 'public affairs' or educational programming in off times, but I don't know. He had, if I recall correctly, 5 stations leased. I think 3 were to ministries that bought all the airtime.
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Infomercials - An Endangered Species??
- Thread starter CaliRadioFan
- Start date
Where I live COX Cable Channel 74 airs infomercials 24/7. The program guide has this channel listed as XTRA, Anyway they air 30 minute infomercials in 3 hour blocks meaning the infomercial will air 6 times in a row in a 3 hour time period. The same with Cox Cable Channel 128 which is something callled YurView TV. It's not 24/7 infomercials, but it shows them so often it may as well be.
Talking about unique infomercial programming that is actually not bad: Good Morning Texas on WFAA TV.
The entire hour is filled with products, services and events hosted by two anchors. They don't push for the sale and the anchors simply let the 'client' show, demonstrate and talk about their product. The anchor hosting that segment will ask a question or two. Each segment is in the 3 minute range, maybe up to 5 minutes. It might be a dentist speaking about implants and how easy and painless the process has become. It might be a band playing at a fundraising event and they perform a song. They don't really mention price. The impression is you have two WFAA anchors introducing local products or services available locally. No 800 numbers. It's rather classy and the anchors toss on enough personality they have some limited draw as in you feel like you know a bit about them.
I thought this was a great way to monetize programming outside the conventional infomercial.
The entire hour is filled with products, services and events hosted by two anchors. They don't push for the sale and the anchors simply let the 'client' show, demonstrate and talk about their product. The anchor hosting that segment will ask a question or two. Each segment is in the 3 minute range, maybe up to 5 minutes. It might be a dentist speaking about implants and how easy and painless the process has become. It might be a band playing at a fundraising event and they perform a song. They don't really mention price. The impression is you have two WFAA anchors introducing local products or services available locally. No 800 numbers. It's rather classy and the anchors toss on enough personality they have some limited draw as in you feel like you know a bit about them.
I thought this was a great way to monetize programming outside the conventional infomercial.
CW7 at 1:30AM airs JTV almost every night sometimes on the weekends later at night since they have aired some soccer games Detroit FC this summer. Late Friday/early Sat from 1:30AM to 8AM it's JTV until The CW puts that E/I crap which should be Saturday morning cartoons. WXSP from 6AM to 9AM airs paid programming other than that Andrew Wommack use to be Believer Voice Of Victory and 2AM since Cops repeats ended last year in the fall. WXSP never dropped Cops after George Floyd's killing.
Gray seems to be the worse at least the Fox, The CW & MyNet TV stations on the weekends looks like paid programming until 4PM or 5PM on the few TV stations I have looked at for Gray TV on TV Passport is Gray that cheap not to air a movie or an off-net sitcom or drama. CW7 airs movies from 1PM to 5PM sometimes 5:30PM on Saturday & movie at 3PM on Sunday Wipeout is on Sundays at 1PM & Boundless at 2PM. WXSP puts a 2-hour paid programming at 3PM to 5PM, spread it around Sunday 1:30PM is paid programming, 2:30PM to 4PM.
WXMI Fox17 airs Fox paid porgramming at 2AM to 4AM late Sat/early Sun since they put that E/I block on Saturday morning kinda surprised that Scripps doesn't move it to WZPX.
Gray seems to be the worse at least the Fox, The CW & MyNet TV stations on the weekends looks like paid programming until 4PM or 5PM on the few TV stations I have looked at for Gray TV on TV Passport is Gray that cheap not to air a movie or an off-net sitcom or drama. CW7 airs movies from 1PM to 5PM sometimes 5:30PM on Saturday & movie at 3PM on Sunday Wipeout is on Sundays at 1PM & Boundless at 2PM. WXSP puts a 2-hour paid programming at 3PM to 5PM, spread it around Sunday 1:30PM is paid programming, 2:30PM to 4PM.
WXMI Fox17 airs Fox paid porgramming at 2AM to 4AM late Sat/early Sun since they put that E/I block on Saturday morning kinda surprised that Scripps doesn't move it to WZPX.
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Yes, insider info, JTV buys subchannel availabilities even if they aren't all day. Apparently we were on a subchannel in Chicago sharing a channel with a Spanish network. A lady always called to complain "that foreign station is interfering with you in the morning"
JTV is also channel 78 on Spectrum 24/7.
I literally had all the channels memorized as we asked callers what channel they were watching when they called in.
CBS owned KCAL 9 in Los Angeles has just made a big cutback in available Paid Programming to 7 hours during the weekend in small portions sprinkled throughout the two days. They have added more new court shows (Relative Justice and Forensic Justice) for a large 6am-4pm block, stopping twice at 9am for The 700 Club and The Noon News, during the week. They have also added 10am Weekend Replays of CBS Saturday and Sunday morning News. Will be interesting to see if other stations have or will be making such rollbacks, weekends especially.
WPSG recently replaced their 6a-8a block of infomercials with new shows:
6a/6:30a - The Balancing Act
7a - Scene of the Crime
7:30a - Forensic Justice
6a/6:30a - The Balancing Act
7a - Scene of the Crime
7:30a - Forensic Justice
Informercials only mutated it's not endangered. It's a case of these newer companies are moving their segments to YouTube .4 Patriots are one of them.
Another one are Online Gurus hyping up get rich scheme on YouTube.
Another one of these are Guru ads.
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I've noticed that Ion Television is down to 2 hours of informercials a day now. They are only showing them between 2-4AM CT (3-5AM ET). I remember when, back in the mid-2000's, what was then i - Independent Television was running about 18 & 1/2 hours of informercials a day.
Pax & I Suck Network the paid programming network as I liked to call them I kinda wish that someone would buy WZPX and make it a full-time WB station as WZPX would put The WB on a 22-hour delay The WB Sunday would air Monday at 6PM. The only thing that was in pattern was Kids WB/The WB afternoon in 2006 for the last few months of The WB before The CW launched in the fall of 2006. I knew WZPX wasn't going to get The CW which I thought would be WXSP only reason they didn't get The CW was sports and why The CW went to WWMT DT2 subchannel took WZPX channel number 7 which moved to channel 14 in the fall of 2006.
The late Billy Fuccillo of the Fuccillo Automotive Group would air 30-minute paid spots titled "Huge TV" in markets where his dealerships were located. They ended shortly before his health declined.
I remember about 6 or 8 years ago there was a guy who was going to various auto dealerships, telling them he'd put together a 30 minute infomercial for them, they'd air it either on stations or cable system in their market, he'd give them market exclusivity and wouldn't produce any infomercials for dealerships other than theirs within a certain distance, etc. It was basically him interviewing the owner and sales manager every several minutes, playing on the "theme" those dealerships sometimes used in their standard marketing, then doing wide shots of that host doing general sales pitches every few minutes while the staff of the dealership held up signs in the background telling people to call now or visit their showroom, and all of them were yelling and shouting for people to come in for a test drive. It was put together to kind of feel like a mix of a live broadcast breaking into regular programming, PBS pledge drive and long-form commercial all in one.
Great idea in principal, but there were areas where cable channels or broadcast stations would overlap between markets and it was somewhat laughable to flip between channels and see the same guy making the same pitches and using the same format for multiple dealerships, with the staff of each one holding up and waving the same signs in the background, with similar graphics on the screen, etc.
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"Cops" has returned to the FOX Stations (and perhaps a few more) in a rather sneaky Infornercial style route: Full length episodes from the most recent Paramount Network run, with the commercial breaks all about the FOX Nation streaming service.
One of the newer commercials I've seen is for "ID Police" - basically a rolling stamp that you use to cover up names, addresses and personal information on documents like credit card statements or offers, banking info and similar. It prints the "ID Police" logo over everything, supposedly blocking potential thieves from seeing and stealing your information. The infomercial hawks them for as little as $9.99 (it says if purchased in bulk). I'm not sure these would be much more effective than just using a black marker. For not much more $$, you can buy a decent quality cross-cut shredder that'll give a lot more security than a rolling stamp.
Today I saw one with a new tactic.. It was a commercial for felt pads that wrap around the bottom of your chair and table legs to help protect your floors from damage when you slide them. They were selling these things for 99 cents each, when they probably cost about a dime each to manufacture in Asia. At the end of the commercial the baritone-voiced announcer said "Stand by for an important announcement!" A red and yellow box flashed on the screen, proclaiming that these things would no longer be manufactured soon so you MUST CALL NOW before they're gone. The announcer explained that, due to rising costs of manufacturing and shipping they could no longer afford to offer these amazing floor saving devices.. And those that do order were limited to a maximum order of...Only 48! Lol. So they frightened older folks watching the commercial into buying now and ordering 48 of them at 99 cents each for a total of $50, when it cost less $5.00 max to actually manufacture them.
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I'm starting to see these more and more as well..Along with "save the elephants from poaching" and others. Problem is, when you actually look up some of these non-profits, by the time they pay a whole suite of executives, pay for a celebrity spokesperson, pay for commercials to be created and aired, cover administrative costs, etc. sometimes only a few pennies of every dollar donated goes to directly support the cause they're advertising. Some heads of non-profits that are always begging for money are taking home larger salaries than the heads of some big corporations..And donations to supposedly help people, animals and victims are covering their pay long before any victims are actually helped.
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