Oprah Winfrey has received another big bailout check for her own; for her OWN network that is. I know you might be thinking why would Oprah Winfrey need a bailout check with her recently being ranked as the highest-earning woman in entertainment, according to Forbes magazine; earning $290 million from May 2010 to May 2011.
Well, it is what it is. Winfrey’s OWN network has not being doing too well and now, Discovery Communications, Winfrey’s partner in the channel, invested an additional 15 million dollars to promote and expose the OWN network to new viewers.
Discovery will carry the Oct. 10 premieres of both “The Rosie Show” and “Oprah’s Lifeclass” at 7 p.m. and 8 p.m. respectively across five Discovery networks: TLC, Planet Green, Investigation Discovery and Discovery Fit + Health in addition to OWN.
Discovery is also running ads across all 14 of its cable networks leading up to the premieres and is even running ads on several broadcast rivals to promote the shows, according to The New York Post. Discovery is expected to spend $15 million on the push, sources tell the newspaper, outstripping the $10 million it spent on the launch of OWN. Ads are also appearing in weekly magazines, on billboards and on TV.
This isn’t the first time OWN officials have had to hit the reboot button. The channel has revamped its programming and overhauled management multiple times since its inception. Oprah, who wrapped up the final season of her syndicated show in May, took charge of her namesake cable channel this summer after Discovery CEO David Zaslav told her that OWN needed her to be “all in.”
Discovery needs OWN to be successful, as it has spent more than $200 million to fund the channel and has sold major marketers such as Procter & Gamble on multiyear ad deals.
Source: www.eurweb.com
