Tampa: Pricier
even before political surge
Demand for inventory was already up, led by auto and finance
By Diego Vasquez
Jan 30, 2012
Tampa, St. Petersburg and Sarasota combine to make up Florida's largest TV market, and it's a tight one squeezed even more in recent weeks as political spending surged ahead of tomorrow's presidential primary.
TV spending and unit pricing in the market are up single digits so far in 2012, with a number of categories increasing spending over last year, including auto, banking and finance, pharmaceuticals, insurance, telecom, retail and professional services.
TV inventory in the Tampa Bay area has been tight going back to at least mid-December, when the lowest unit-rate political window opened ahead of the presidential primary.
"Overall the market is pacing higher than last year, and with so much political going into the market you won't get a good break on rates," says Ann Caskey, senior local buying strategist at Empower MediaMarketing.
TV inventory will loosen up a bit in the weeks and months following the presidential primary, but political spending will kick into gear again at the end of June, when the political window opens for the Aug. 14 primary for Senate, congressional and local races.
The state primary was originally scheduled for Aug. 28, but lawmakers moved it up a couple weeks so it wouldn't conflict with the Republican National Convention, which takes place in Tampa Aug. 27-30.
The Tampa market is expecting $40 million in political spending this year just in the races for president and U.S. Senate. The outlook is for roughly $2 million in spending in first quarter, $5 million in second quarter, $10 million in third quarter and $23 million in the fourth quarter.
"The news dayparts will be where most candidates will target, and that will probably affect the NBC and Fox stations [the most], which have really strong news," Caskey says. "They both have the highest-rated newscasts."
As appears to be the case in many markets, one beneficiary of the tight conditions on TV will be radio.
Like TV, the radio market in Tampa is expected to be up this year, and inventory is tightening with rates up slightly versus a year ago.
News-talk radio stations will get a good amount of political spending, but much of the medium's growth will be spurred by traditionally strong radio categories such as fast food and auto, the latter of which tends to spike during the last two weeks of each month as dealers try to kick up their monthly sales numbers. Yet buyers can get good deals on some of the market's top stations.
"Radio is really competitive in Tampa, with three station groups that own the top 10: Cox, CBS and Clear Channel," says Caskey. "A lot of times you can buy all the Clear Channel, CBS or Cox stations and get a better deal that way."
In fact, in December those three groups accounted for the market's top 18 stations ranked by average quarter hour rating, according to Arbitron.
Another option for buyers in the Tampa market is cable TV, which can be a more efficient buy than broadcast.
Says Caskey: "We're moving a lot of money into cable because the programs there are doing so good and it's a little more affordable. Usually you get a better rate on cable even with similar ratings."
This article is reprinted from the Media Economy Newsletter. You can subscribe by following this
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