Spanish Upstarts Gain Market Momentum
Local Strategy, Diverse Fare Boost Exposure, Ratings
By Laura Martínez -- Multichannel News, 11/4/2007 5:00:00 PM MT
A growing number of independent television stations have sprung up nationwide, pitching themselves as an alternative to Univision and Telemundo, and catering to mostly Spanish-dominant audiences in Hispanic markets such as Los Angeles, Houston, Dallas and South Florida.
“These stations are really interesting for cable operators that are trying to expand their [Spanish-language] offerings,” Nielsen Media Research senior vice president of Hispanic services Doug Darfield said.
Leading the pack is Burbank, Calif.-based Liberman Broadcasting, the largest privately held, minority-owned Spanish-language broadcaster in the United States.
Established in 1987 by the father and son partnership of José and Lenard Liberman, the company has steadily grown to include three production facilities; 21 radio stations and four television stations serving Los Angeles, Houston, Dallas and San Diego. In the most recent July sweeps period, Liberman’s full-power Los Angeles station, KRCA, was No. 2 in prime time among males 18-34 and 18-49, after the local Univision affiliate, KMEX.
KRCA’s programming, most of which is produced in one of the company’s three facilities, targets the primarily Mexican audience living in the market. Among Liberman’s popular series are the top-rated Secretos and spinoff Secretos Houston, a reality show that draws large audiences among Mexican viewers in the Houston area, who tune in to catch people in embarrassing situations, sometimes with their pants down … literally.
According to the company’s second quarter results, Liberman saw an 11% jump in net revenue to $32.5 million, compared to the second quarter 2006, mostly attributed to increased ad revenue from the company’s Los Angeles and Dallas radio markets. At press time, Liberman executives could not be reached.
“They manage to run a very healthy business,” said Roxane Garzón, broadcast media director at Costa Mesa, Calif-based Casanova Pendrill, which handles Hispanic TV buying for such clients as the California Lottery, Johnson & Johnson, Corona and L’Oréal, among others.
Garzón said she has bought time on Liberman, on radio and TV, even though some of their programming tends to be sensationalistic. (Liberman was behind the controversial 2004 reality show Gana la Verde, in which undocumented U.S. residents competed for immigration advice from an attorney by submitting themselves to a series of scare tactics, such as eating worm-filled tamales.)
But Liberman is only one among the swelling ranks of independent programmers. Other such stations include Spanish Broadcasting System’s Mega TV, which last month launched nationwide via DirecTV; WJAN (América TeVe); Caracol TV Internacional’s WGEN TV, CaribeVisión’s WFUN-TV; the digital multicaster V-me TV; and the recently launched TuVisión on Pappas Telecasting’s former Azteca America affiliates.
“Some of them are doing really well and generating a real alternative to strip novelas Monday through Friday,” said Nielsen’s Darfield. “The local markets have the capacity to incubate new products.”
| Sizing Up Top Markets | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Hispanics remain one of the fastest-growing population segments, with TV households increasing by 4.4% over the previous year, according to Nielsen Co. Los Angeles continues to remain the No. 1 Hispanic market, followed by New York and Miami. | |||
| Top 10 Markets Ranked by Hispanic Homes | |||
| Rank | Market | 2007 Hispanic TV Homes | 2008 Hispanic Homes |
| SOURCE: Nielsen Media Research, “Local Television Market Universe Estimates: Hispanic or Latino TV Households” |
|||
| 1 | Los Angeles | 1,775,100 | 1,817,270 |
| 2 | New York | 1,190,410 | 1,207,480 |
| 3 | Miami-Fort Lauderdale | 625,280 | 635,610 |
| 4 | Houston | 492,360 | 524,810 |
| 5 | Chicago | 454,050 | 468,440 |
| 6 | Dallas-Fort Worth | 431,560 | 458,410 |
| 7 | San Antonio | 356,930 | 367,650 |
| 8 | Phoenix | 332,510 | 358,440 |
| 9 | San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose | 340,200 | 352,900 |
| 10 | Harlingen-Weslaco-Brownsville-McAllen | 268,650 | 279,880 |
THE MIAMI INCUBATOR
Nowhere has this trend become more alive than in Miami, the nation’s No. 3 Hispanic market, with 635,610 Hispanic TV homes or 5.2% of total U.S. households, according to Nielsen’s market universe estimates for January 2008.
For the first time in a ratings book, Miami now has eight Spanish-language TV stations: four networks (Univision, Telemundo, Telefutura and Azteca America) and 4 independent stations (WGEN-TV, Mega TV, WJAN América TeVe and WFUN-TV CaribeVisión).
“If you want to know what the Spanish-language TV market is going to look like in five years, you have to look at the Miami market,” said Roberto Vizcón, general manager of Miami-based GenTV, which was founded in 2006 and caters to Hispanics regardless of country of origin. The Caracol-owned full-power station is one of several Spanish-language outlets that face growing competition, not only from the traditional local broadcasters (Univision and Telemundo) but also from smaller rivals hoping to get a piece of the local advertising market, estimated at $160 million.
“The proliferation of TV outlets in Miami was long overdue,” said José Cancela, principal of Miami-based Hispanic USA, a marketing consulting firm.
Another player in this competitive market is WJAN América TeVe, which originally launched in 1994 as Tele Arte but then relaunched a few years later with a focus on Cuban-Americans. Under the leadership of Argentinian TV veteran Omar Romay, América TeVe has managed lately to beat its counterparts in certain time slots. “Everybody knew there was an unattended niche here. The question was, is it possible to produce Cuban TV in exile and, more importantly, at a reasonable price?” said Romay about the station’s decision to relaunch WJAN in 1999.
Romay’s change of strategy and the station’s close ties with the local community even earned him the appointment as “honorary Cuban” by Miami’s Cuban-American community, something he explains simply as a recognition from the audience he targets. “The Miami market has favored us with their preference, because we have focused on becoming a service [to the community],” said Romay, son of Argentinian broadcast legend Alejandro Romay.
SIPHONING RATINGS
Among América TeVe’s most popular shows is A Mano Limpia, a daily talk-show hosted by Dominican journalist Oscar Haza, that has siphoned some primetime rating points from Telemundo programming in the same time slot. According to July 2007 figures from the Nielsen Hispanic Station Index, A Mano Limpia garnered a 3.5 rating among men 25-54 in the 8-9 p.m. slot, beating Telemundo’s Madre Luna (3.3), Univision’s Amar Sin Límite (2.0) and Telefutura (1.3).
The station’s success has to do in part with a hyper-local strategy, a growing number of original programming hours and the hiring of well-known talent. In late October, WJAN was set to announce the debut of a show from Nelson Bustamante, a prominent figure on Radio Caracas (RCTV), the Venezuela TV station that was shut down earlier this year by President Hugo Chávez.
The latest entrant to the Miami market is CaribeVisión Station Group, a partnership between former Telemundo and Univision executive Carlos Barba and Mexico City-based Grupo Pegaso, a company founded by Alejandro Burillo Azcárraga.
CaribeVisión launched in Miami and New York on Sept. 11, and at press time was scheduled to launch in Puerto Rico. Its programming mix includes sports, entertainment and movies through partnerships with TV Azteca, TeleFé Internacional, TVGlobo, Antena 3, Tele 5, Telefilms and Warner Brothers.
“We want to position ourselves as the ultimate experience for the Caribbean audience,” said CaribeVisión president of entertainment Jorge Rojas. A native of Puerto Rico, Rojas is also a veteran of Spanish-language television, who like many of the top executives leading the new crop of stations, has worked for Univision and Telemundo in the past.
CaribeVisión targets Caribbean communities on the East Coast, though some of its primetime fare, including telenovelas, comes from Mexico City-based TV Azteca, through a five-year-old partnership.
Also testing the waters in the Spanish-language market is TuVisión Stations Group. The Pappas-owned network soft-launched in July on five stations, including WAZH Houston, KTNC San Francisco-Oakland and KAZR Reno, Nev. Under the leadership of Fernando Acosta, TuVisión is programmed with purchased programming, including Brazilian telenovelas, talk-shows, movies and music.
By the end of 2007, Pappas expects to clear TuVisión on an additional 15 stations, covering nearly 40% of the Hispanic population.
Unlike other independent stations seeking hyper-local audiences, Mega TV has opted for a nationwide exposure. The SBS owned-and-operated station launched in 2006, officially marking the radio group’s entry into the TV business, and last month launched nationwide on DirecTV Más, the satellite provider’s Hispanic-targeted package. “The plan is [and always has been] to create an alternative to Univision and Telemundo,” said Hudson, a 20-year veteran of Spanish-language media who had previously worked at Univision and Telemundo networks.
Hudson said several original productions will be incorporated into the new channel concept of “Radio en Televisión” (radio on television) with SBS radio shows such as El Cucuy from Los Angeles’ La Raza 97.9 and El Vacilón de la Mañana from New York’s Mega 97.9 serving to expand the radio brands onto television.
Also getting national exposure is V-me TV, the 24-hour multicast digital network that launched in March 2007 through an unusual partnership between public television and a privately held company, V-me Media.
The network, which is presented by public television stations and carried on digital cable and satellite, is now available in over 30 million homes and is programmed for bilingual and Spanish-speaking Latinos. Programming comes mainly from relationships with production companies, including PBS producers WGBH and Thirteen/WNET, BBC Worldwide, Sesame Workshop and Hit Entertainment.
Since its debut, V-me has put a strong emphasis on its children’s programming, considered “sacred” by its founders. “Prior to launching [V-me], we engaged in a very comprehensive research among U.S. Hispanics; and the first response was about children programming,” V-me president Carmen DiRienzo said.
In addition to the children’s block, which runs as long as 6-hours each day, the network has made a point to purchase and produce programs that touch on global public affairs, something virtually nonexistent in Spanish-language channels.
One such program is Viva Voz, a one-hour, nightly one-on-one interview show designed as a platform for discussion of issues important to Latinos.
“The current state of Spanish-language television is such, that more and different programming is required,” said DiRienzo. “And that is exactly our goal, our mission.”
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