TORONTO – So this is why Corus Entertainment paid $73 million for Canadian Learning Television.
CLT, licensed by the CRTC in 1996 and launched as one of the final few Canadian analog cable channels back in 1999 by former majority owner CHUM Ltd., wasn’t valued so much for its programming or brand. Its value lay in its analog slot on most cable systems in the country as well as pre-existing satellite carriage – and that Corus knew it could take advantage of that.
CLT was part-owned by CHUM and Alberta educational channel Access and never did find ratings success – and when CHUM was sold to CTVglobemedia, CLT was then spun off to Corus in March of this year. The channel earned a pre-tax profit $7.3 million for the broadcast year 2007 on $17.1 million in revenue. But just $1 million of that revenue came from advertisers.
After the CRTC gave its blessing to the sale, Corus went to work to re-launch the channel as Viva – a new service aimed at women in the 40-64 year-old range. The new brand, which is already available to over 5.1 million homes, rounds out a triple-play of women’s brands for the company to go along with digi-net CosmoTV (for the 18-25 set) and W, for women in between.
Try to think of the channels this way, Susan Schaefer, vice-president of marketing for Corus Television told Cartt.ca: While Cosmo TV is Jessica Alba or Sienna Miller and W is Sandra Bullock, Viva is more like Susan Sarandon or Diane Lane.
“They told us they’re not their mother’s 50 anymore,” said Schaefer in describing what potential viewers told them during research done prior to the channel’s launch.
Just less than three weeks since the channel debuted, Schaefer says she’s pleased with audience results (but it’s too early to release numbers, she adds). “We’ve set targets and are meeting or exceeding those targets,” she added.
The group who really likes the idea are advertisers. “They are asking more and more about this important boomer segment,” said Schaefer. “They were ripe and ready for it.” The target market of Canadian women in that age bracket is 5 million strong and growing, says the research.
Women of the age targeted by Viva (and we bet some 40 year-olds will cringe at being included in the “boomer” category, just like 44-year old Sandra Bullock might…;) feel left out of the TV categories right now. “They feel largely ignored,” said Schaefer. “There hasn’t been a channel for them.”
But the good thing with that group is that they watch a lot of TV – 30 hours a week – as compared to the 18-34 group watching just 22 hours or so, she added. “They are the TV generation… They grew up with it.”
And, explained Schaefer, the company is sticking to the old CLT license, too, where “learning” is a key aspect. “This is an opportunity to build a bigger audience (but) we absolutely will conform to the conditions of license… These women are into lifelong learning.”
