Lifetime, Media Edge Kick Off Cable Upfront

After a protracted period of posturing and inactivity, the cable and broadcast upfront ad-sales markets finally began percolating last week.

Lifetime Television, for one, closed a deal with The Media Edge, WPP Group's media-buying unit, network executive vice president of ad sales Lynn Picard confirmed last Thursday.

The women-oriented network's move followed news that NBC had taken the risky step of cutting ad revenues in a gambit to jump-start the sluggish market. According to published reports, the maneuver helped the Peacock wrap up about half of its expected upfront take in the process.

NBC's play was expected to push the other broadcasters to lower their pricing. However, buyers have complained to cable sales executive that CBS has been the slowest mover among the "Big Four."

That's due to Viacom Inc. president Mel Karmazin's directive to hold the line at last year's pricing. Sources said Karmazin has even been making sales calls himself.

This year's upfront has also bogged down under the weight of more haggling about cross-platform deals between big agencies and media conglomerates. Historically, most of cable's upfront activity has come after the broadcasters secure the lion's share of their deals.

Broadcast's intransigence this spring, though, may finally be stirring some schedules on the cable side.

Typically an early mover, The Media Edge buys for Young & Rubicam, Ogilvy & Mather and J. Walter Thompson Co. accounts such as AT&T Corp., American Express Co., Ford Motor Co. and Eastman Kodak Co.

Lifetime's Picard said some agencies and clients are also expressing interest in digital networks that have sufficient distribution. For example, Lifetime Movie Network — now in almost 16 million households — has migrated onto Madison Avenue planning maps.

Lifetime also grabbed a piece of the estimated $25 million cross-platform deal that Toys 'R' Us inked with Walt Disney Co.'s ABC Unlimited unit last week. "We're part of that too," Picard noted. Disney holds 50 percent of Lifetime.

Elsewhere, sources said The Media Edge had wrapped upfront buys with A&E Television Networks, USA Networks and Turner Broadcasting Sales Inc.'s TBS Superstation and Turner Network Television.

A Turner spokesman said its upfront had yet to break, while an A&E spokesman declined comment. USA officials did not return calls by press time.

Meanwhile, sources said Bcom3's Starcom MediaVest Group is another major media shop that is "moving along" on its cable and broadcast upfront negotiations for clients ranging from General Motors Corp. and McDonald's Corp. to Kraft Foods, Kellogg Co. and Procter & Gamble Co. A Starcom spokeswoman declined to discuss its upfront dealings.

Grey Advertising's Mediacom Worldwide and Omnicom Group's OMD USA are the other major buyers poised to enter the bargaining phase, according to network sales executives.

Still, before all is said and done, cable's upfront may not wrap up until well into July or August, various industry watchers predicted.

"Cable is kind of taking a back seat to broadcast so far, but there have been a few deals made here and there," one cable executive noted.

There have even been some changes within the cable space, the executive noted. Budget registrations — traditionally the first step in the upfront process — "have been equal to, and even higher than, a year ago for the more targeted networks," he said, particularly among upscale demos. But the forecast calls for lower costs per thousands.

The hitherto leisurely negotiating pace comes in sharp contrast to last spring's bazaar, when a sales blitz brought in record tallies for both broadcast and cable by the end of May. But some of that euphoria dissolved earlier this year, when a number of major advertisers exercised quarterly options, slashing millions from those year-ago commitments.

In recent weeks, cross-platform deals have stolen much of the ad-sales spotlight from the lackluster upfront. First, there was the Procter & Gamble Co.'s $300 million deal with Viacom Plus, via Starcom. That was followed by Tricon Global Restaurants Inc.'s reported $90 million deal, through The Media Edge, for its fast-food units KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell with News Corp.'s cross-sales entity, News Corp. One.

Last week, Viacom declined comment on a published report which said Pfizer Inc. was considering a Viacom Plus deal.

Meanwhile, industry sources said other one-stop shopping deals are brewing, some of which would link P&G, Tricon and McDonald's Corp. with other media conglomerates' cross-platform entities, including AOL Time Warner Inc.'s Turner Global Solutions operation and Disney.

Although none of the cross-media deals announced thus far involved his shop's accounts, TN Media Inc. senior vice president Howard Nass called such buys "the wave of future."