TORONTO – No more zombies, slick ad salesmen, or meth dealers on Rogers? That’s the warning that AMC has gone public with as its contract negotiations with Rogers Communications appear to be festering.
Sunday night, during the airing of The Walking Dead, a crawler appeared at the bottom of the TV screen informing viewers to “take action” by going to www.keepamccanada.com. There viewers could choose from email, phone, Facebook or Twitter to contact Rogers and urge it to keep AMC in its channel lineup.
While AMC’s shows such as The Walking Dead, Breaking Bad and Mad Men are big hits south of the border, they have been slower to catch on in Canada where none made the BBM’s latest Weekly Top 30 TV Programs. In comparison, AMC’s recent mid-season three premiere of The Walking Dead was the strongest telecast for a series in U.S. basic cable history for adults 18-49 with 7.7 million, according to reports.
AMC said in a statement that “While we are hopeful we will reach an agreement with Rogers Cable that recognizes the popularity of our programming with their customers, we believe we owe it to our loyal viewers to inform them of the potential loss of AMC and its popular shows.”
But Patricia Trott, Director of Public Affairs for Rogers told Cartt.ca “We have no intention of dropping AMC.” A similar message was also posted on the Rogers Facebook page.
“We’re surprised and disappointed that AMC would alarm our customers by taking this action. We are in contract negotiations with AMC and expect to reach a positive outcome. These types of negotiations with our programming partners are a normal and important part of our efforts to keep costs down and to provide our customers with the best TV and entertainment programming,” added Trott.
An AMC spokesperson did not return Cartt.ca’s request for an interview.
This is the second such contract dispute between a Canadian BDU and an American broadcaster in 2013. As first reported by Cartt.ca, Telus still says it is dropping Viacom channels BET and Spike as of Thursday because the two can't come to a new carriage agreement.
