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PBS execs seek to lower bar for 30-second spots

Originally published in Current, Oct. 4, 2004
By Jeremy Egner

To sweeten the appeal of corporate underwriting, PBS management has recommended letting more funders into its Premier Sponsorship club, which gives them 30-second credits instead of 15-second spots.

PBS hopes the club will add some new faces by admitting underwriters whose spending exceeds $1.5 million. The present threshold is $2.5 million.

Wayne Godwin, chief operating officer of PBS, says the move would build on the success of the Premiere Sponsorship, which has attracted $12.3 million from 11 sponsors including Allstate, Toyota and Johnson & Johnson since September 2003. He predicts lowering the threshold would draw another “$12 million to $15 million.”

Most member stations responding to a recent PBS survey favor lowering the threshold, Godwin says. As the economy and competition make it harder to sell underwriting, public TV stations increasingly accept the lengthened credits. PBS itself no longer opposes them, as it did in 1995 when it caused a near-rebellion by trying to extend the national 15-second limit to local credits airing adjacent to PBS programs.

PBS hopes to present its current recommendation to the Board at its Oct. 19 [2004] meeting. If approved, it would be effective immediately.

In its memo about the survey, PBS said that the lower threshold would strike the best balance between the system’s need for revenue and its desire to keep its air relatively uncluttered.

Many station reps say the present $2.5 million threshold merely impedes sponsors and that viewers are disturbed more by commercial-sounding scripts than by greater length. Al Jerome, president of KCET in Los Angeles, doesn’t believe public TV has to restrict who can purchase 30s if it imposes strict language guidelines.

Other station managers worry that longer spots will further blur the line between PBS and its commercial peers. State-owned networks in particular oppose longer spots and credit beds out of fear that cluttered air might jeopardize aid from state governments.

South Carolina ETV President Moss Bresnahan says an advisory task force appointed by PBS did not come to a consensus on the issue. As head of one of the largest state networks, Bresnahan thinks PBS is moving too quickly to add 30-second credits and says the appearance of “more commercial-looking spots is bound to confuse our stakeholders.” He adds, “We seem to be accelerating toward commercialism.”

Longer credits may confuse the state legislators that appropriate roughly half of SCETV’s annual budget, he says.
Nebraska ETV Executive Director Rod Bates has similar concerns but reluctantly supports reducing the threshold. “Looking more commercial is not something I relish,” he says. “But we can’t keep increasing member dues.”

The Nebraska network already runs 30-second local spots, Bates says. The most troubling part of the proposal to him is how longer spots would be accommodated.

The pods of underwriting credits at the beginning and end of programs are now restricted to 60 seconds, and PBS would keep that limit where all underwriters are corporations. But pods could grow as long as 90 seconds if the extra 30 seconds are spots for foundations or government agencies, as they are for many shows.

“That makes me very nervous,” Bates says. A member of the task force, Bates says PBS showed a “worst-case scenario” video of an extended pod at the end of a program followed shortly by a station break and then another long pod of credits.

“When you string them all together, despite the fact that it’s appropriate, it looks very commercial to me,” he says.
Cathy Hogan, PBS senior director, program underwriting policy, says the worst-case string of clutter went on about 11 minutes total, but she says eight minutes would be more typical.

Godwin expects viewers will encounter longer pods but says PBS can’t jeopardize support for its programming by refusing to adjust to market realities.

He says most surveyed stations support stretching the pods. And Bates, despite his reservations, says his concerns about the system’s financial health trumps other considerations.

Other advocates of the lower threshold agree: PBS must attract more corporate sponsors with credits of the 30-second length they know from commercial TV.

“The reality of the marketplace now is that only a limited number of sponsors would spend” the $2.5 million now needed to secure 30s on PBS, says Lance Ozier, v.p. for national program marketing at Boston’s WGBH.

Big-name underwriters such as Volkswagen, ExxonMobil and Fidelity have aired the longer credits with WGBH programming.

Ozier says WGBH is also sweetening the deal for underwriters by offering unique special-event sponsorships and other off-air benefits.

“The days of philanthropic buys on public TV are essentially over,” says Rob Flynn, director of communications for The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. “People underwrite for media value and we have to be able to respond in a market-savvy way.”

Adds KCET’s Jerome: “Underwriting on public TV is still different” from commercials on network TV, “but sponsors still want a marketing impact.”

WNET Marketing Director Audrey Koota says the big producing station has secured sponsors such as Siemens and New York Life at the current Premiere level and thinks a lower threshold would bring an influx of new partners. “It’s easier to get two sponsors at $1.5 million than one at $2.5 million.”

She says automakers and credit card companies, for example, aren’t interested in funding shows unless they can have 30-second spots.

Like Jerome, Koota wouldn’t object to lowering the threshold below $1.5 million so long as PBS enforces strict language guidelines.

No matter what happens with the economy, the 30-second limit may be only temporary, Bates says.

“We’ve pushed the envelope further than we’ve ever pushed it, so hopefully the economy turns around and we don’t have to think about it anymore,” Bates says. “But if things continue to slide, we may be having this conversation again in the not-too-distant future.”