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sales@spotsndots.com Copyright 2020.The Daily News of TV Sales Thursday, October 22, 2020

ALMOST ONE-THIRD PLANNING TO TAKE ON DEBT Americans are getting ready to celebrate the holidays with more Zoom calls and online shopping than expected, making them plan ahead of time for their holiday shopping, USA Today reports. More than 25% of consumers have already completed their holiday shopping for the year, according to a LendingTree survey. The survey by the online lending service shows that one in four Americans finished their holiday shopping by the first week of October. The early shopping could be driven by federal aid provided as millions of Americans continue to be unemployed. “Because of the coronavirus relief bill, increased unemployment benefits and overall reduced spending during the last six months, many Americans have a little more money in their bank accounts today than they otherwise would,” said Matt Schulz, chief credit analyst for LendingTree. “It’s possible that some folks have taken advantage of that surplus to do a little early holiday shopping.” Among the consumers buying ahead of time, over 44% were parents with children under 18. Nearly half of the consumers also have household incomes of $100,000 or more. The survey also highlights how Americans expect to go into debt due to their holiday shopping. Over 31% of consumers expect to go into holiday shopping debt over the coming months. Among those who were laid off or furloughed due to the pandemic, 47% expect to go into holiday shopping debt. More than half of consumers with a household income of $100,000 or more expect to go into holiday shopping debt compared to 26% of those with a household income of $50,000-$74,999. Shoppers’ preferred method of payment for their holiday shopping: credit cards. Over 47% will use a credit card to pay for their purchases this holiday season, while 44% will pay with a debit card and 26% will pay by cash or check. Meanwhile, a report from KPMG says consumers plan to spend less and buy fewer gifts this holiday season, with the average budget reduced 18% versus a year ago. According to the survey, 41% of consumers say they’re not planning to attend Black Friday sales in person. “Faced with considerable uncertainty and reduced household income, consumers are spending less this holiday season, focusing on essential purchases for the home and gifts for close family members,” said Scott Rankin, National Advisory Leader, Consumer & Retail, KPMG. “Retail customers are forming new shopping habits, which are expected to continue into 2021 and beyond.” The report, Season of Reckoning: 2020 COVID-19 Consumer Pulse/Holiday Report, says average per-person spending this holiday season is expected to fall to $515 from $627 in 2019, with a majority shopping in October (25%) or November (38%).

SURVEY: 1 IN 4 HOLIDAY SHOPPERS ALREADY FINISHEDADVERTISER NEWS Procter & Gamble blew through analyst expectations for the just-ended fiscal first quarter, with organic sales up 9% to $19.3 billion, net earnings up 19% and no signs that the dwindling effects of this spring’s U.S. stimulus is making people trade down to cheaper products. P&G increased marketing spending at least $100 million last quarter, Co-Chairman and CFO Jon Moeller said on an earnings call. That came as P&G continues to wring savings out of over-head, media, agency and production costs at a pace of more than $200 million last quarter... Amazon.com has launched a new program that asks members to send in 10 receipts per month for purchases made at businesses that it does not own. For sending in the receipts, participants will earn $10 that can be applied to their Amazon balance

or gifted to charity. Additional rewards are available for completing optional surveys. The program is currently invite- and opt-in only… Arizona reached a $5 million settle-ment with Honda Motor’s U.S. units yes-terday in a probe into defective Takata air bag systems, state Attorney General

Mark Brnovich said. The settlement follows an $85 mil-lion settlement announced in August with nearly all other U.S. states... Apple Pay point-of-sale transactions have in-creased in recent months, states a report by Pymnts, which notes a rising preference for touchless payments since the pandemic began. Eight percent of U.S. consumers who have the feature enabled say they have used it, compared with 4.9% surveyed before March... The Container Store has teamed with KonMari Media, the company created by decluttering star Marie Kondo, to launch a line of about 100 co-branded products. The Container Store x KonMari line will be sustainably produced and is designed to ap-peal to consumers looking to simplify and make the most of their space, the companies said... J.C. Penney CEO Jill Soltau expects the retailer to wrap up a deal to be acquired by Brookfield Property Partners and Simon Property Group and exit Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection before Christmas, CNBC reports... Nestlé says the pandemic has increased consumers’ health consciousness, boosting its small but fast-growing health-sciences unit and contribut-ing to better-than-expected overall sales at the world’s largest packaged-food maker. The owner of Nescafe cof-fee, DiGiorno frozen pizza and Purina pet food has previ-ously benefited from a pandemic-era shift by consumers to comfort food — particularly big, trusted brands — as they stocked up and stayed home during lockdowns... Bar Lou-ie emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization in May during the pandemic that brought new challenges, re-quiring flexibility and quick thinking, CEO Tom Fricke said. The 73-unit Texas-based gastropub chain has scaled back ambitious restaurant opening plans and focusing on de-livery in partnerships with six major delivery services, and with the creation of the virtual concept Sweet Lou’s.

PAGE 2 The Daily News of TV Sales @ www.spotsndots.com

AVAILS Account Executive, Temple/Killeen, Texas: KWTX News 10 and CW12 are seeking an enthusiastic, highly motivated Account Executive who can connect with clients and help them achieve their business objectives through effective TV and digital advertising. The ideal candidate will possess excellent communication skills, have an enthusiastic and outgoing personality, along with a drive to succeed. Most importantly, we are looking for a hard-working salesperson who wants to have FUN at work,

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THIS AND THAT Halloween retailers face new challenges in the year of the pandemic, including a surge in online orders that has Fun.com, parent of HalloweenCostumes.com, scrambling to find employees to fulfill more than a million orders, CEO Tom Fallenstein said. Consumers are expected to spend about $8 billion on Halloween this year and 30% of them plan to buy costumes online, according to a National Retail Federation forecast... Homebuyer demand is incredibly strong compared with last year, but there appears to be a slight pullback this month. A drop in buyer demand caused total mortgage application volume to fall 0.6% last week compared with the previous week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s seasonally adjusted index... The nation’s homebuilders are seeing no fall chill in demand from buyers, and that has the industry more confident than ever. Builder sentiment set a record high for the second month in a row, jumping to 85 in October on the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index. September and October are the first two months the index has ever been above 80. Anything above 50 is considered positive.

SPORTS DOMINATE SEPTEMBER TV VIEWING September was unlike any TV programming month we’ve seen before. Given all the COVID-19-related sports delays, in addition to the usual return of football, the NBA, NHL and MLB were finishing out their delayed seasons. As such, sports reigned supreme on TV. According to Vizio’s Inscape, the TV data company with insights from a panel of more than 16 million smart TVs, of all the live, linear minutes watched during September, the top three programs by watch-time were NFL, NBA and MLB telecasts, with college football coming in sixth. (NHL games did not make the top 50 programs by watch-time.) Specifically: 5.16% of minutes watched went to NFL football; 1.86% went to NBA basketball; 0.94% went to MLB baseball; and 0.78% went to college football. For NFL games, NBC was the most popular network, capturing 1.54% of watch-time, followed by Fox (1.25%) and ESPN (0.86%). For the NBA, TNT was tops for minutes watched (0.88%), while ESPN had 0.84% of the time spent watching NBA games. Inscape’s viewership crossover data reveals that of all the live sports in September, viewers of other sports also heavily tuned into NFL. The highest crossover: 79% of people who watched college football, MLB and/or NHL also tuned into NFL games. The lowest crossover: 13% of NBA and NFL viewers tuned into NHL matches.

NETWORK NEWS CBS has shared the start dates for five scripted series. Comedy The Unicorn has its Season 2 premiere Nov. 12. Drama Bull has its Season 5 opener Nov. 16. FBI begins Season 3 and FBI: Most Wanted starts Season 2 on Nov. 17. Season 4 of SEAL Team begins on CBS on Nov. 25. Series production has been staggered for all networks due to COVID-19 issues. CBS previously shared premiere dates for other scripted series, including comedies Young Sheldon, Mom and B Positive on Nov. 5, and NCIS: Los Angeles and NCIS: New Orleans returning Nov. 8... Fox won the Tuesday prime ratings race, the opener of the World Series, Los Angeles Dodgers versus Tampa Bay Rays, propelling the network. Fox had a 1.8 in viewers 18-49, per the Nielsen overnights, and an 11 share. Fox had baseball across prime, at 2.1, then 1.7, then 1.5. Game 1 got a 3.5 in 2018 and a 3.1 in 2019, that one with the Washington Nationals against the Houston Astros... Fox’s four returning drama series, 9-1-1, spinoff 9-1-1: Lone Star, The Resident and Prodigal Son, will be back on the air with new seasons in January (no exact premiere dates yet). The network also unveiled tweaked Monday and Tuesday lineups. Flagship 9-1-1 and medical drama The Resident — both headed into Season 4 — will remain 8 PM anchors on Monday and Tuesday, respectively. 9-1-1: Lone Star, whose first season aired as a bridge between the fall and spring portions of 9-1-1, will now follow the mothership series at 9 PM. The move displaces Prodigal Son, which will move into the Tuesday 9 PM slot vacated after the end of Empire. Both 9-1-1: Lone Star and Prodigal Son are entering Season 2.

10/22/2020

Conan O’Brien

My father has always cast a long shadow in my life.

Mostly because he’s thin and only comes out at sunset.

The Daily News of TV Sales @ www.spotsndots.com PAGE 3

AUTONATION REPORTS ITS ‘BEST QUARTER EVER’ AutoNation CEO Mike Jackson says the coronavirus pandemic has significantly shifted American attitudes toward personal vehicles, leading to the company’s blowout earnings report yesterday. “Coming out of the lockdowns, they said, ‘So much for sharing everything. I’d really like to have my own space that I define,’” Jackson told CNBC. The largest U.S. auto dealership chain posted third-quarter revenues of $5.4 billion, eclipsing Wall Street forecasts of $5.19 billion. The company’s adjusted earnings per-share of

$2.38 was an all-time record and topped expectations of $1.65. “It’s our absolute best quarter ever,” Jackson said. “The demand for individual mobility has gone through the roof, and I think this pandemic/shelter in place has shifted the American psyche in a long-term way, and it’s hard to predict past five years, but for the next three to five years, there’s been a shift in demand,” he added. Surging auto demand is present across

all price points and for both new and used vehicles, said Jackson, who added that the interest in buying cars has been buoyed by “incredibly low” interest rates.

PARKS: U.S. OTT VIDEO SERVICES NUMBER 300 New data from Parks Associates suggests the number of OTT video services has more than doubled in the past six years to 300 platforms through through the third quarter (ended Sept. 30). Steve Nason, research director at Dallas-based Parks, said the coronavirus shutting down movie theaters and studios delaying the release of major titles to next year, accelerated OTT video adoption among consumers. “The decision to delay the latest James Bond film No Time to Die hit the theater industry hard, and Disney’s announcement to move the Pixar film Soul to Disney+ shows studios are putting more emphasis on streaming,” Nason said in a statement. The analyst contends that with studios also owning digital distribution, increased experimentation with transactional VOD and theatrical windowing is on the agenda. Nason called the recent partnership between NBCUniversal and Roku to distribute new streaming service Peacock as a “win-win” for both parties.

10/22/2020

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NEW SEASON BEGINS WITH FEWER AD DOLLARS Total national TV entertainment advertising sank 25% in September to $2 billion, mostly due to the lack of TV network primetime programming for the new TV season, according to MediaRadar. Major TV networks experienced massive TV production delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which in turn has pushed out many new TV shows and content launches for the 2020-2021 TV season to start in November or later. Typically, new TV season show premieres begin in the third week of September. For the first nine months of this year, overall national TV programming was down 6% to $42.3 billion from $45.1 billion in 2019, the media/advertising research company says. Looking specifically at three major content categories — entertainment, sports and news on English-language national TV advertising platforms, broadcast, cable, and national TV syndication — these genres were collectively down 9% to $35.3 billion. Sports content declined 13% to $7 billion for the nine-month period. College football, for the month of September, dropped 41% to $190 million from $330 million versus the same month in 2019. Many games and college football schedules have been cancelled or delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For the January-September period, total TV entertainment programming was down 8% to $23.4 billion, with TV news content slipping 4% to $4.8 billion. In June, media agency company GroupM estimated total U.S. national TV advertising is expected to decline by 11% in 2020 to $38 billion — rising to 6% to $40.1 billion in 2021. MediaRadar tracks advertising across national broadcast and cable networks. Using an algorithm, with confirmed buys from its partners, the company attributes spend to each TV commercial spot. Then it analyzes ad spending based on type of TV programming category.

BARELY SIX MONTHS IN, QUIBI CALLS IT QUITS Quibi Holdings is shutting down a mere six months after launching its streaming service, a crash landing for a once-highflying startup that attracted some of the biggest names in Hollywood and had looked to revolutionize how people consume entertainment. The streaming service, which served up shows in 5- to 10-minute “chapters” formatted to fit a smartphone screen, has been plagued with problems since its April debut, facing lower-than-expected viewership and a lawsuit from a well-capitalized foe, The Wall Street Journal reports. “Our failure was not for lack of trying,” founder Jeffrey Katzenberg and Chief Executive Meg Whitman said in an open letter to employees and investors. “We’ve considered and exhausted every option available to us.” Katzenberg and Whitman decided to shut down the company in an effort to return as much capital to investors as possible instead of trying to prolong the life of the company and risk losing more money. Employees will be laid off and will be paid a severance, the Journal reported, and Quibi will explore selling the rights to some of its content to other media and technology companies.