V8 Supercars is approaching the halfway point of its first season under its new television arrangement, whereby the whole championship season is live on pay-television network Fox Sports with six events live and the rest delayed on the free-to-air channel, Ten Network.
The record-breaking $241 million deal has been described by many as necessary for the series to sustain a healthy grid of competitors, though its late move to pay television compared to other Australian sporting codes has left many fans unhappy.
Many believed the $50 per month asked for fans to watch the whole series live would alienate the sport’s demographic, though others insist V8 Supercars has only followed the template of the majority of codes. After all, even AFL and NRL fans can’t watch every game on free-to-air networks.
But, based on figures following the most recent Townsville event, V8 Supercars is tracking on par with recent seasons that were exclusive to Channel Seven, which only really committed to live events with little in the way of additional programming.
On a like-for-like basis, comparing the same events year on year, the 2015 audience is up nine per cent. The biggest gain is clearly the total amount of coverage afforded to the series on Fox Sports, which telecasts the full day’s racing across a whole event in addition to regular replays and weekly non-racing programming.
So while the free-to-air presence is down, analyst Repucom found sponsorship recognition is 40 per cent greater on last year given the close to 300 per cent extra coverage.
Things are only looking up for V8 Supercars for the second half of the 2015 season. Of the remaining eight events on the calendar, four are live on free-to-air in addition to Fox Sports, including the main event, the Bathurst 1000.
With the three long-distance two-driver endurance events all live on free-to-air ahead of the Sydney 500 finale, there will be significant momentum across both platforms at a time when the AFL and NRL seasons wrap up.
While that’s little comfort for those who cannot afford a Foxtel subscription, it’s important to remember that the series may not have survived with a reduced free-to-air television deal, while the fan-base may have seen less and less of the series as free-to-air’s interest in non-prime time sports waned.
As the AFL, NRL and most other codes have proven, the Australian sporting television landscape has changed dramatically over the last decade and a Fox Sports component is the only way for codes to grow financially and to give the core fan-base the type of coverage it demands.
As V8 Supercars CEO James Warburton recently told V8X Supercar Magazine, “Ingrained viewer behaviour takes time to change. The thing that matters is the total cumulative reach of V8 Supercars into the community. And that’s increasing significantly.”
The next test of the new arrangement, though, will be the uptake of sponsorships from next season. A number of key backers are up for renewal at the end of the year. And they will be analysing the numbers very carefully. What they think could prove the true worth of the new arrangement.
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