Broadcasting Telecasting (Oct-Dec 1957)

INTERNATIONAL continued they have in fact leaned over backward to avoid any possible impression of connection between the advertising and the selection or content of these programs. They admit their rules are "stern" but feel it is better to err in this direction than in the direction of being easy-going. As an example, it is forbidden to incorporate any program characters or masters of ceremony in the commercials themselves. This is even carried so far as to prevent any apparent resemblance between people in the program and those featured in the commercials, even when the same individuals are not actually involved. The avowed objective is that the viewer should always be able to tell quite clearly for himself when he is watching entertainment and when he is watching an advertisement, just as he can distinguish between editorial and advertising material in the press. Many advertisers, however, are already wise in the ways of program and time selection. Even though they are not able to sponsor programs as they do in the U. S., they can plan the spotting of their announcements so as to obtain just about the "setting" they want and to reach the kind of audience they want. On Sept. 23, 1955, only one out of every 77 homes in the United Kingdom could get independent television (ITV). Now, more than one in every four can and does — 3,660,000 families of a total of 14,480,000 in the entire British Isles, or about half the television homes in the country. Five mil In The SCRANTON MARKET Chart based on average Pulse ratings for 12 quarter hours . . . 6:00 to 9:00 AM . . . November, 1956 li W A B C D E all £ OTHERS J For 27 years, Scranton's top salesman. Bill Pierce dominates the audience in eight ^m Pennsylvania counties served by WEJL. &&MEEKER lion of the country's seven-million-plus television homes actually lie within range of good regular reception of at least one of the four English commercial transmitters (plus something like 400,000 covered by the Scottish transmitter at Black Hill). The London area now has IV2 million homes equipped to receive the commercial transmissions, Birmingham 800,000 and the Northern Region IV2 million. And these families whose sets can tune in commercial programs have shown a decided preference for the independent television schedules. During July 1957, ITV's 3V2 million homes devoted 2.7 out of 3.6 hours viewing a day to the ITA; 0.9 of an hour to the BBC. The total is up from last year. A year ago (1956), ITV's V/2 million homes spent 2.2 hours a day viewing the ITA, 1.3 hours viewing the BBC, a total of 3.5 hours. The amount of daily viewing varies seasonally, of course. Last March, homeswith-a-choice put in 1957's highest average yet, 4.3 hours a day; during July 3.6 hours. Habits vary, too, from one ITA area to another. During the peak month of last March, Londoners averaged 4 hours a day, Northerners 4.5 hours and Midlanders 4.7 hours. Midlanders, indeed, have a positively American appetite for television — without America's opportunities, where most set-owners have a choice of at least four stations and anything up to 16 or more hours telecasting per day. Yet, over the weekend of Feb. 21, Midlanders put in an average of more than six hours a day, celebrating the end of "the toddlers' truce" (the 6-7 p.m. period when television theretofore had been "blacked out" so parents could get children to go to bed). In all areas, the daily average is a lot higher over the weekends than on weekdays. From October to May, Midlanders consistently put in 5 hours or more a day on Saturdays and Sundays — 5Vi hours during March; Londoners peaked with 4.8 in November and February, Northerns just broke 5 in February (5,2) and March (5.1). Taking all areas together the weekday average viewing was about an hour a day less than the weekday viewing. Comparing Britain and America, the Nielsen Television Index (U. S.) shows that the average television home in the United States spent an average of 3.9 hours a day viewing during July 1957. British multichannel homes spent 3.6 hours, taking all ITA areas together. So far in 1957, March produced the highest figure in Great Britain with 4.3 hours a day compared with an average for the same month in the U. S. of 5.4 hours. In January, when U. S. viewers averaged 6.1 hours, British Independent Television homes notched 4.1 hours. What sort of homes listen to British commercial television? Typically, they certainly are not the aristocratic or "upper-class" homes. They, are free-spending middle-class and "working class" homes whose standards of living might seem low by U. S. criteria, but who in fact have "never had it so good." Pick a thousand-strong representative sample of the multi-channel households in the ITA's London Area, and you'll find BRITISH AGENCIES IN TV J. WALTER THOMPSON LTD. ERWIN WASEY & COMPANY LTD. S. H. BENSON LTD. YOUNG & RUBICAM LTD. LINTAS LTD. MASIUS & FERGUSSON LTD. COLMAN, PRENTIS & VARLEY LTD. MC CANN-ERICKSON ADVERTISING LTD. IMMEDIA LTD. G. S. ROYDS LTD. MATHER & CROWTHER LTD. LAMBE & ROBINSON LTD. FOOTE, CONE & BELDING LTD. GREENLY'S LTD. ALFRED PEMBERTON LTD. PRITCHARD, WOOD & PARTNERS LTD. C. J. LYTLE (ADVERTISING) LTD. SERVICE ADVERTISING COMPANY LTD. SAWARD BAKER & COMPANY LTD. G. STREET & COMPANY LTD. W. S. CRAWFORD LTD. OSBORNE PEACOCK LTD. Page 84 December 2, 1957 3,300 people— 2,400 adults and 900 children under 16. A similar sample in the Northern Region again will yield 900 children but slightly more adults — 2,500 — making 3,400 in all. In the Midlands, you'll find 3,600 people. The number of adults will be the same as in the North — 2,500. But there'll be 1,100 children. You'll find at least one child in all but 375 of the Midland homes. But 444 of the Northern homes will be childless and exactly half — 500 — of the London Area ones. They'll be wage-earning homes for the most part. In 790 of the London homes, the head of the household will be earning less than £ 15 ($42) a week; as he will in 914 of the Midland homes, and in 936 of the Northern homes. Very seldom indeed will you find him pulling down more than £25 ($70) a week; in 76 of the homes in the London area, only 17 in the North and a meager 7 in the Midlands. The vast majority of these heads of households will have left school before their 14th birthday — -686 Londoners, 765 Midlanders, 806 Northerners. And while in the London area 93 will have stayed at school till they were 17 or more, only 43 will have done so in the North, and fewer still — a mere 36 — in the Midlands. Also writing in Advertisers' Weekly, Michael Patmore, who is a director of J. Walter Thompson in London, calls attention to one of the fundamental differences between television and all other media in Great Britain. "This unique quality," he says, "might be called the 'simultaneousness' of television advertising. Just as each television screen possesses a certain hypnotic quality, the fact that an article being advertised on television will be seen by millions of widely separated and different people, at precisely the same minute, provides an impact unrealizable in this country before independent television." Mr. Patmore also comments on the way British advertisers have coordinated their television advertising with other merchandising and selling activities. He refers to the Broadcasting