'Big Brother' takes lead in autumn TV lineup
By : Anna Kocinska
With the announcement by TV stations of their new autumn programs, the race is now on by companies to take a greater share of audience viewing figures.
For TVN, which plans to launch a second edition of "Big Brother," its new schedule attempts to reaffirm its strong market position. But for smaller stations such as newcomer TV Puls, the fall lineup is about surviving this year's advertising slump and the competition from established veterans such as TVP (public television) and Polsat.
TVN's star will continue to shine this fall despite a summer drop in audience figures, market watchers said. Marcin Boglowski, head of the TV division at Mediacom, a Warsaw-based media house, said TVN's drop in audience share from 15% to some 10% this summer should not be taken as a sign of a decline in business. "The core of their (TVN) audience comes from cities, and summer is the time when everybody leaves town," Boglowski said. "So I still think this fall will belong to TVN. Their technical reach has increased to some 80% and their programming is good, which makes it easier to persuade advertisers to advertise on TVN."
Above all, TVN will build on the runaway success of "Big Brother" to woo viewers. "Last season the show was the driving force behind their audience ratings," said Krzysztof Nozynski, analyst with AGB Polska market research institute. "There were days when it had a better audience figure than TVP (public television) and Polsat. It ("Big Brother") also helped to increase viewership of other TVN programs."
But the reality-show hit is not the only ammunition in TVN's arsenal. TVN's new lineup also includes game shows, movies and documentaries. In October, the station will launch its new game show, "Shafted" the newest production of Endemol Neovision, the Warsaw-based company that will also produce the second edition of "Big Brother." TVN will also continue with the popular "Millionaires" game show.
Edward Miszczak, programming director of TVN, said that documentaries will also add weight to the station's fall lineup. He said the station plans to launch a series of shows he refers to as "doc soaps," a combination of a documentary and soap opera. TVN's lineup will also include movies provided under its contracts with Warner Brothers and DreamWorks.
With the combination of new shows and movies, TVN is emerging as one of the main players in the TV market.
"TVN will be competing with the big ones. (Polsat and TVP)," Mediacom's Boglowski said. "So far it's been treated as a supporting, smaller player, but now it can be used as the second station in ad strategies.
