Outdoor Life Pumped Up With Tour de France

Cable World, July 30, 2001 by Staci D. Kramer

No ratings, but plenty of e-mails

Outdoor Life Network is pedaling as fast as it can to turn the reported $3 million it spent for the rights to air the Tour de France into a higher-profile event with viewers and cable operators.

While the network points to a flood of 5,000 e-mails and a fairly jammed switchboard, no one knows how many people are actually tuning in for its unprecedented live coverage of nearly every day of the three week race--or for its additional four hours of tour coverage.

OLN reaches 36 million cable and satellite households, but it won't finalize a contract with Nielsen Media Research until Comcast's acquisition of the network is completed. OLN was able to use July as a demonstration month with Nielsen and expects a report in mid-August. Because it is a trial, the ratings report will not be as detailed as those of regular Nielsen clients.

One reason for buying a high-profile sporting event like Tour de France is to boost distribution by getting fans to call their cable company to add the network so they can watch the race. In an ironic twist, some fans complaining that they couldn't watch the coverage are served by Comcast systems that dropped OLN earlier this year. Comcast subscribers in Philadelphia and Delaware got a reprieve of sorts when Comcast's regional network, CN8, arranged to broadcast OLN's live coverage on a tape-delayed basis for the last week of the race.

Comcast says the network is available in nearly half of its 8.5 million homes. "We are a supportive distributor of OLN and would expect to continue to be a supportive distributor," said Comcast spokesperson Jenni Moyer.

Even with popular Texan Lance Armstrong in the lead for his third victory, there's no escaping that cycling is a niche sport. Sunday recaps of the Tour de France on CBS are averaging a 1.27 rating, down nearly 20% from the 1.5 ABC posted last year when it shared the rights with ESPN. (Last year's final day coincided with the British Open and was shifted to ESPN.)

While that could suggest less interest in cycling, it's equally possible that it reflects the shift of viewers who don't feel the need to watch a Sunday wrap-up show when they have been following the race on OLN during the week.

The CBS show takes some of the air out of OLN's tires. Under the terms of its four-year agreement, OLN cannot televise live races on Sundays. The ban extends to streaming live audio on its website, Olntv.com.

OLN would like to readdress the live coverage ban for next year, says John West SVP-ad sales. But, he added, "It's in our interest to drive highest number to the CBS show."

As for ad sales, West said, "we did OK this year--phenomenally well in this market." In addition to the show on CBS, OLN also bought time on Fox SportsNet for a half-hour show it produced. OLN sells the ads on the CBS and Fox SportsNet shows.

The network is on target to profit on the deal by year three "strictly on a financial basis by advertising revenue versus rights." None of this year's ad deals were multiyear. The Mercury division of Ford had exclusivity in the auto category. Other advertisers included Nike, the U.S. Postal Service (sponsor of Armstrong's team), Bristol Meyers and several cycling-specific companies.

Traffic to the network's recently relaunched website is up considerably in page views and unique visits, according to Brad Friedrich, vice president of interactive media for OLN and sibling Speedvision. Friedrich said the network would not release any numbers until the full results could be studied.

But much of the traffic to Olntv.com is being driven by its status not just as the U.S. rights holder but as the official English-language site of "Le Tour." (Surfers beware typing in www.tourdefrance.com instead of www.letour.com leads to a porn site.)