Spots N Dots
The Daily News Of TV Sales
September 23, 2016

RECORD SPENDING FORECAST FOR HALLOWEEN

UP $1.5 BILLION OVER LAST YEAR

Americans are looking forward to splurging on their favorite candy and costumes this Halloween season. According to the National Retail Federation’s (NRF) annual survey conducted by Prosper Insights & Analytics, total spending for Halloween is expected to reach $8.4 billion, an all-time high in the survey’s history—up strongly from $6.9 billion last year. U.S. consumers are expected to spend an average of $82.93, up from last year’s $74.34, with more than 171 million Americans planning to partake in Halloween festivities this year.

“After a long summer, families are excited to welcome the fall season celebrating Halloween,” NRF President and CEO Matthew Shay said. “Retailers are preparing for the day by offering a wide variety of options in costumes, decorations and candy, while being aggressive with their promotions to capture the most out of this shopping event.”

According to the survey, 67% of Halloween shoppers plan to buy costumes (kids offerings from Party City are shown), for which they will spend a total of $3.1 billion. The next biggest dollar volume is—you guessed it!—candy, at $2.5 billion and bought by 94.3% of Halloween shoppers. 70% will buy decorations, spending $2.4 billion in total, and 35.4% will buy greeting cards—a total of $390 million in greeting cards.

When it comes to preparation, 71% of consumers plan to hand out candy, decorate their home or yard (49%), dress in costume (47%), carve a pumpkin (46%), throw or attend a party (34%), take their children trick-or-treating (30%), visit a haunted house (21%) or dress their pet(s) in costume (16%).

Slightly more people will be looking online for the perfect costume (35%) than in brick-and-mortar stores (29%). The survey found that social media is the fastest-growing influencer for the perfect costume, particularly Pinterest (17%), which has seen 133% growth since 2012. Some other places for inspiration include friends/family (19%), Facebook (17), pop culture (16%) and print media (14%).

“Consumers are eager to celebrate Halloween, especially given that eight in 10 Americans will shop by mid-October. That is the highest we have seen in the survey history,” said Prosper Insights principal analyst Pam Goodfellow.

When it comes to where consumers will shop for the season, physical stores still have the edge. 47% of shoppers will visit discount stores to buy their Halloween-related items this year and 36% will visit a specialty Halloween/costume store, up from 33% last year. In addition, 26% of customers will visit grocery stores/supermarkets, 23% will visit department stores and 22% will shop online.

ADVERTISER NEWS

More landlords are buying into the concept that having Aeropostale open at reduced rent is better than having a vacant store. As we reported earlier, mall operators Simon Properties and General Growth Properties teamed with Authentic Brands Group to buy the bankrupt chain and have been negotiating with other landlords to lower rent payments. The New York Post reports new deals will keep another 75 stores open, with the total now up to 475 compared to the original 229 expected to have been saved……Rite Aid is reiterating it expects to be swallowed up by Walgreens before 2016 ends. For the fiscal quarter that ended on 8/27, comparable pharmacy sales were down a surprising 3.6% with front ends up a tiny 0.1%. Generic introductions were cited for the pharmacy declines……AutoZone same-store sales were up 1.0% in its fiscal fourth quarter, which pulled the full fiscal year gain down to a 2.4% increase. The chain added 71 new stores in the latest quarter to reach a total of 5,297 in all 50 states and D.C.……Bed Bath & Beyond comp store sales for its second quarter were down 1.2% and its profit fell from $201.7 million in the quarter last year to $167.3 million this year. The Wall Street Journal notes that along with lower sales, margins have shriveled and recent wage pressures have added to the company’s troubles……It has taken a while for General Mills (and other cereal makers) to stabilize sales of breakfast cereals, and now that those declines have abated the Mills’ yogurt business is dragging down results. Total U.S. retail sales fell by 8% in the latest quarter, with particular weakness shown by the Yoplait brand……CarMax said it’s seeing a greater demand for older, less expensive used vehicles. Cars older than 4 years rose to 24% of sales in the latest quarter, up from 21% in the same quarter last year……7-Eleven is the largest brand in convenience stores in the country (although recent acquisitions by Alimentation Couche-Tard assure the Circle K brand will grow rapidly) and Convenience Store News reports 7-Eleven parent Seven & I Holdings plans to more than double store count from the current 8,500 owned units to 20,000 U.S. stores. Japanese-owned Seven & I took over the brand in 2005 and Irving, TX-based 7-Eleven Inc. operates and franchises the chain now…… Albertson’s will add more banners to its click-and-collect e-commerce business using the MyWebGrocer platform. To date most of its efforts have been just with Safeway stores, but plans now are to start offerings at some Jewel-Osco, Shaw’s, United Supermarkets, Acme and Star Market units.

NETWORK NEWS

ABC is developing a new Magnum P.I. sequel revolving around the iconic character’s daughter. The series will be produced in a partnership between Leverage creator John Rogers and actress Eva Longoria. The new program is being described as “an action-packed drama in the same style as the original. It follows Magnum’s daughter, Lily “Tommy” Magnum, who returns to Hawaii to take up the mantle of her father’s PI firm.” The original series launched in 1980 and ran for eight seasons on CBS……NBC has renewed the reality series, Better Late Than Never. The program features Terry Bradshaw, William Shatner, Henry Winkler, George Forman and comedian Jeff Dye. Better Late Than Never had a limited run on NBC for the summer season……Regional NFL games on FOX helped boost the numbers for FOX’s coverage of Major League Soccer. This past Sunday’s soccer games averaged 1.3 million total viewers, per Nielsen, and that was in part due to the matches airing adjacent to regional coverage of the NFL games. The network aired the Toronto FC vs. New York Red Bulls game at 5 PM (ET) in markets that carried the 1 PM (ET) NFL game. In markets with the late NFL game, the network aired Sporting Kansas City vs. The LA Galaxy. This was the first time in 21 seasons that Major League Soccer aired next to NFL games, and based on the ratings success, it won’t be the last……CBS will air the premiere of its new MacGyver reboot tonight at 8 PM (ET), and will rebroadcast the program Sunday night at 10:30 PM (ET). The drama stars Lucas Till as Angus “Mac” MacGyver and George Eads as Jack Dalton.

WEDNESDAY RATINGS

Empire retained the number one position in the Nielsen A18-49 rankings on Wednesday night. The FOX drama posted a 4.1 rating in the demo, tying the finale from last season. However, it was off the 2015 season premiere, which had a 6.7 demo rating. The season premiere of Modern Family on ABC was the second best performer among the returning shows with a 2.6 rating, while The Goldbergs’ season premiere posted a 2.0 and black-ish did a 2.0 with a rerun. NBC’s Blindspot managed to get a 1.3 at 8 PM (ET), while Law & Order: SVU delivered a 1.8 and Chicago PD got a 1.6 in the demo for its season premiere. CBS premiered Survivor at 8 PM (ET) with a 2.3 rating and the Big Brother finale picked up a 2.0 rating. The CW aired reruns of Penn & Teller: Fool Us, posting a 0.3 and Whose Line Is It Anyway doing a 0.4. The ABC drama Designated Survivor, with Kiefer Sutherland, was the best performer of the newcomers with a 2.3 A18-49 rating, more than doubling the Nashville number in the same time slot last season. Speechless, also on ABC, pulled a 2.0 and Lethal Weapon on FOX delivered a 2.2.

TESLA SUES TO SELL IN MICHIGAN

Tesla’s fight to be able to sell its cars in all states—without franchised dealers—has escalated. Less than a week after the Michigan Secretary of State rejected its applications to open a dealership and service facility in Grand Rapids, Tesla has sued in federal court. The lawsuit asks the court to rule that the State of Michigan and its laws violate Tesla’s constitutional rights. It charges that a law passed in 2014 effectively gave franchised dealers a state-sponsored monopoly.

GAWKER GETS UNIVISION REBRANDING

Univision has set up a separate operating unit for the Gawker Media properties it purchased at auction in August. The unit will be called the Gizmodo Media Group and the Hispanic broadcaster has hired Raju Narisetti to manage the various sites within the unit. Narisetti is a former News Corp. executive.
AVAILS
During the second presidential debate the moderators will be picking questions based off of what's trending on Facebook. Which will explain their opening question, ‘Is Blac Chyna too good for Rob?’
--Jimmy Fallon

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SPOTS N DOTS
The Daily News Of TV Sales
September 23, 2016

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