• Business & Career Building

  pricing for cable programming

  Posted by John Joseph on January 10, 2008 at 4:10 am

  My company has been operating as a post facility for broadcast tv producers for years in addition to producing DVDs for the home video market. Up to now we have not created original programming which we sold directly to a cable network.
  We are considering creating our own original shows to sell to various cable nets. My question is, how much do networks pay for magazine type shows. I understand that the scale is quite broad and prices vary by type of program and specific network. A range and examples would be very helpful.

  I would like to consider the econimics of this endeavor before we begin to develop any concepts.

  Thanks
  John

  Walter Biscardi replied 18 years, 6 months ago 2 Members · 1 Reply
• 1 Reply

• 

  Walter Biscardi

  January 10, 2008 at 11:19 am

  Honestly I’ve heard numbers from $10,000 – $100,000 per episode. The average seems to be $25,000 – $40,000 per episode.

  Newer shows generally get on the low end of the scale unless you’re bringing in a major star.

  An excellent resource for questions like this is the ReelScreen Summit which is held in Washington DC each year. I went two years ago and have never had one on one face time with the heads of Discovery, History Channel, TLC, Food Network and several others like I did there. You can flat out ask them what their target budgets are and what they are looking for in the new season.

  Walter Biscardi, Jr.
  Biscardi Creative Media
  HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.

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