ESPN Loses Subs, Republican Viewers Too

by Wayne Friedman , May 12, 2017

It seems ESPN is not just losing overall U.S. subscribers via pay TV providers, but Republican-leaning viewers as well.

Across 43 markets analyzed, Deep Root Analytics says that on the main flagship ESPN network there were 5% fewer Republican-leaning viewers in 2016 than 2015.

Other ESPN channels showed steeper declines: ESPN2 had 10% fewer of these voters, while ESPN News sank 36%; ESPN Deportes was down 27%; and ESPNU lost 12%.

Looking at all the markets, 34 among 43 showed that the flagship ESPN network became less Republican in 2016 -- which in turn means that the ESPN audience became more Republican in nine markets.

Analysts and business executives have been concerned about the Walt Disney’s ESPN sports network group for over a year now. Since 2011, ESPN has lost about 12% of its overall pay TV subscribers -- now totaling 88 million, down from 100 million.

Looking at recent overall viewing at ESPN's two main channels -- ESPN and ESPN2 -- in the first quarter of this year, Todd Juenger, senior media analyst for Bernstein Research, says ESPN’s average total viewers was down 7% with ESPN2 gaining 14%. Among key 18-49 viewers, ESPN lost 8%, with ESPN2 adding 11%.

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6 comments about "ESPN Loses Subs, Republican Viewers Too".

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Jacquelyn Bullerman from Arbitron, May 15, 2017 at 11:30 a.m.
Without a comparative number of how the nation as whole is identifying itself when this survey was taken, I don't think these numbers really have much context.

The GOP "brand" has really had quite a few eventful 100-days or so. As a result, without a new baseline to understand the context around these numbers there is no way to know if ESPN seen a decline or is this decline just reflective of a larger parttern?
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Ed Papazian from Media Dynamics Inc, May 15, 2017 at 12:43 p.m.

Quite right, Jacquelyn. To make any sense, of this, one needs the changes in total audience for comparison to the GOP-leaning "viewers"---who, one suspects, are mainly older folks. If overall viewing----this, too needs a definition ( is it "subscribers", or monthly reach or average quarter hour audience? )---dropped by 4% while republican "viewers" declined by 5% then one might sthetch it a bit by contending that ESPN's "audience" is in free fall among Rebublicans---note, I'm being a tad sarcastic here. If, however, the total "audience" dropped by 7% while GOP fans declined by only 5%, then the channel is losing mainly among Democrats and Independents.

Leonard Zachary from T___n__, May 15, 2017 at 1:29 p.m.

The trendline the past few years is unbundling pay TV and subsciber losses. The fact is most payTV promotions clearly indicate broadband is subsidizing and hiding payTV subscriber numbers. Skinny bundles is payTV dying by a thousand cuts. Keep up the ghost ED, the TV industry including the news depts will need to dowensize to stay competitive.

Ed Papazian from Media Dynamics Inc, May 15, 2017 at 2:14 p.m.

But skinny bundles will earn the TV networks, their owned/affiliated stations and owned cable channels subscriber incomes, LZ at the same time as reducing the number of competing channels. This will garner them larger ratings and, with that, more ad revenues. Can you figure out what that will mean for the TV networks and their cohorts?Certainly not their demise.

Leonard Zachary from T___n__ replied, May 15, 2017 at 3:27 p.m.

Like I said ED, it will be a downsizing event in a defragmented ecosystem. The best money was made in bloated TV bundles where every cable sub paid in an aggregated ecosystem, but now the surf is going out and we'll see who is naked and who can swim. You fail to recognize the power of search and how it will impact skinny bundles and the rest of available content in the universe where people consume free content and spend majority time especially younger dempgraphics. Skinny bundles are a band-aid to a wounded business model in a downtrend.

Ed Papazian from Media Dynamics Inc, May 15, 2017 at 3:57 p.m.

You fail to understand what is really happening in "linear TV", LZ. By continuing to chant---over and over--- that digital search and attribution techniques are all that will matter to advertisers and that all that counts with TV program providers is the almighty ad dollar, you create an unrealistic scenario. Neither is totally true or false, though, as I keep pointing out, things are evolving. At this point, you are the only savant that has it all figured out as to the eventual outcome. The rest of us, including most of those running digital media, will have to watch, learn, try new ideas and wait and see what happens.