The company’s WPHL, KRON and WTTA drop their MyNetworkTV lineups to carry Nexstar’s CW’s primetime entertainment, live sports and special event programming.
Can Nexstar Finally Turn The CW Into A Profitable Network?
Nexstar has spent the past two years building its national media business with The CW as a central part of that strategy. The CW will soon be put to the test as its third iteration hits viewers.
For TV Station Groups, National Collaborations Increase And Improve
Station groups including Gray, E.W. Scripps and Nexstar are increasingly drawing on their stations to contribute stories for their national reporting projects. The ensuing collaborations are having a transformative effect on news production. Pictured: Susan Campbell reporting a story for one of Gray Television’s “consumer franchises” — Did You Know? — from KOLD Tucson.
The broadcast sales executive with more than 25 years of in-market experience will oversee WJBF and its website, mobile apps, and related social media channels, succeeding the retiring Bill Stewart.
The Nexstar Media Charitable Foundation’s mission is to contribute to and work with public charities and nonprofit organizations to improve the communities in which Nexstar Media and its subsidiaries do business. The foundation was established in 1958 and it makes donations of approximately $350,000 annually.
COO Tom Carter says one problem is “a couple of Japanese nameplates having trouble getting inventory on the lots for their dealers.” However, auto is still the company’s largest ad category.
Exclusives
New owner Nexstar has gutted the network’s roster that former CEO Mark Pedowitz built in favor of low-cost imports and unscripted shows — and a rejected cable drama. Pictured: Sullivan’s Crossing, starring Chad Michael Murray, Morgan Kohan and Scott Patterson, is one of many low-cost foreign series that The CW will program instead of homegrown original series. It’s already aired elsewhere.
Beginning Tuesday he will offer commentary and analysis across the Nexstar network’s daytime and primetime programming, including the new political ensemble program, The Hill, and special election and political coverage.
Nexstar’s 1Q Net Revenue Rises 4%
The increase to $1.3 billion was driven by The CW acquisition that closed on Sept. 30, 2022, as well as growth in distribution revenues.
Cherie Grzech, VP of news and managing editor of Nexstar’s NewsNation, shares the importance of the network’s recent expansion to 24 hours of news each weekday and its two new state-of-the-art studios in New York. She says while other news organizations are cutting staff, NewsNation is still hiring producers and reporters. A full transcript of the conversation is included.
Deal covers 122 TV stations, including MyNetworkTV affiliates and four independents. The agreement also renews carriage of the company’s NewsNation cable news network.
In what was a blockbuster year for the local TV station owner, Nexstar CEO Perry Sook’s 2022 pay package soared to $39.3 million, according to the company’s proxy filing, released Friday. That was up from $21.1 million in 2021. Sook’s 2022 compensation package was driven mostly by a $33.3 million stock grant, with his salary at $2 million, a $1 million bonus, and $3 million in non-equity incentive compensation.
Additional weekday programming, NewsNation Now, will run from 1 to 5 p.m. ET Monday-Friday.
The veteran sales leader will oversee advertising inventory and revenue management strategy for ad sales.
The CW is undergoing another round of staff cuts, sources tell Deadline. More than 15 people were affected, with the marketing/promotional team impacted, along with finance. The laid-off employees are said to include mid- and high-level executives, including some in SVP roles. A rep for CW parent Nexstar Media declined comment. Thursday’s staff reductions come a month and a half after Chris Spadaccini joined the CW as chief marketing officer.
The deep-pocketed pro golf upstart has a revenue-sharing arrangement with Nexstar CW and pays for all of its TV production expenses.
Mission and White Knight stations, which are largely managed by Nexstar, have been blacked out on DirecTV platforms since October.
The multiyear agreement covers the broadcaster’s CBS, CW and MNT affiliates, four indies as well as NewsNation.
Nexstar Media has spent months assembling a massive roster of TV stations; acquiring TV’s CW network; and building the NewsNation cable news network. Now comes the hard part: Getting Madison Avenue to buy ads across all of it. The nation’s largest owner of local TV outlets is ready to make its pitch to advertisers and has already scheduled a presentation for media buyers in New York for April 25. The goal, says Michael Strober, the company’s chief revenue officer, is to showcase the company’s reach among both national and local media. “We can bring local and national to our clients in ways that have never been replicated across the country,” he says.
Despite an impasse between Paramount Global and FuboTV, which has kept Nexstar stations off the air for weeks, Nexstar President and COO Tom Carter has a relatively upbeat outlook on pay-TV’s future. “We are projecting subscriber attrition,” he said, with recent gains on internet-delivered bundles like Fubo, YouTube TV, Hulu + Live TV and others failing to offset deeper declines in traditional cable and satellite. “But make no mistake about it — we do not see a cliff. We’re not at a precipice here, or at a point in time where we’re at an inflection point.”
The Nexstar cable network also is adding a third hour to its NewsNation Live on March 6 at 10 a.m. ET.
CEO Perry Sook: “Today, broadcast television remains the only place where content creators, sports organizations, team owners and, most importantly, advertisers, can access local audiences at scale. We provide reach that no other media can, especially for sports content.”
Nexstar’s 4Q Net Revenue Climbs 19%
The increase to $1.49 billion was driven by strong political advertising revenue and increased digital revenue, offset somewhat by a decline in core advertising.
The CW said today that the LIV Golf’s first official full season of the Saudi-backed league will blanket the U.S. via some CW stations and on Nexstar owned and operated stations in key markets including Chicago, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Tampa and Hartford, Conn.
TV Groups Turn To Solutions Journalism, And Viewers Lean In
Solutions journalism, which presents news consumers with constructive responses to problems, has been gaining traction among station groups including Graham, Gray, Nexstar, Hearst, ABC and CBS. Viewers once put off by relentlessly negative reporting are tuning back in for it.
CEO calls his company “a ‘unicorn’ in the media and entertainment sector and the power of our platform is not something that has been seen before,” describing Nexstar’s portfolio that includes not only the nation’s largest TV station group (200-plus), but also the NewsNation cable network, the recently acquired CW broadcast network and a broad array of digital properties. “We have the same national reach as the larger-cap media companies,” he noted.
KXAN Austin Launches Newsletter On Texas Politics, Government
KXAN, Nexstar’s NBC affiliate in Austin, Texas, has introduced a weekly newsletter to keep residents informed on the top political news of the week. “It really made sense because our station has such a strong history of covering politics,” says Kate Winkle, KXAN’s digital director.
There’s still a lot we don’t know about the LIV/CW deal — details of the agreement between the Saudi-backed league and the Nexstar-owned network were not announced, including financial specifics — but in the days since the news was first reported, there’s also much we’ve learned about how this deal came to be, and what fans can expect from LIV broadcasts in 2023 and beyond. Here’s what we know.
Under the leadership of CRO Michael Strober, Todd Braverman, Brad Epperson and Lori Tavoularis will be focused on a data-driven, multi-platform approach to drive ad sales.
Nexstar Media Group’s stations are halting live streaming their newscasts and other locally produced lifestyle programming as of Jan. 12. In a statement, Nexstar said the move was being taken “to fulfill our obligations to our cable, satellite and telecom partners.” Instead, the local programming will be available on stations’ websites two hours after they are broadcast live over-the-air.
Viewers will be treated to the midnight ball-drop in New York City, and spectacular firework shows from Dallas’ Reunion Tower and from Denver’s downtown area, as well as a 10-minute fireworks show launched from the rooftops of eight Las Vegas Strip hotels.
Comcast Corp. and Nexstar Media Group reached an agreement over the weekend that prevented millions of Xfinity pay TV customers from losing dozens of Nexstar-owned local stations. The agreement comes after Comcast was forced to pull at least one Nexstar-controlled station — WPIX (ch. 11, CW) in New York City — and warned that it might have to drop more if a new contract could not be reached by mid-December.
Things keep getting messier between Comcast and Nexstar, with the cable operator filing a complaint at the FCC late Monday alleging that Nexstar and Mission have failed to negotiate retransmission consent in good faith. It comes as the cable operator faces the possibility of losing more than 90 Nexstar stations this weekend.
Even with a recession looming, executives from Sinclair, Nexstar, Marketron, Horizon Media and JDA Media said at a TVNewsCheck webinar last week that stations still see lots of opportunities for strong selling across a variety of categories, including healthcare, sports betting, legal and more.
With CNN getting ready for more layoffs, NewsNation, Nexstar Media Group’s cable news network, has mounted a billboard near CNN’s Atlanta facility that announces “we’re hiring.”
Nexstar Political Revenues At All-time Record
Political money as of Election Day is slightly over $500 million, or 103% of what was on the books on Election Day 2020. All that remains to be seen is whether there is a senate run-off in Georgia.
It declines C-SPAN’s request for carriage, opting for national exposure on its co-owned NewsNation cable network. Above: WJW Cleveland’s debate between U.S. Senate candidates Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) and J.D. Vance aired on Nexstar-owned NewsNation.
The executive who once brought Schitt’s Creek to Pop TV talks about the future of the network’s current originals and mandates to make broader, highly watched originals that also happen to be profitable.
