Timing Not Best For Couric's Syndie Debut

The syndicated talk show that Katie Couric and her partners at Disney-ABC plan to debut in September 2012 might be a good next step for her — but her timing could be a lot better.

She won’t land the best time period for at least a couple years and then only if she’s lucky and some other talk shows aren’t.

And despite wags who say Couric’s $15-million-a-year contract as the anchor of the CBS Evening News will look piddling compared to the riches awaiting her in syndication, she has probably missed the gravy train as daytime audiences shrink and stations economize.

“The timing is not ideal,” says Bill Carroll, VP of programming for Katz Television, counting up the obstacles. “It’s coming a full year after Oprah so new viewing habits will have been set. It’s coming at the beginning of the second year of most three-year contracts for other talk shows so there aren’t many good spots on the schedule to put her. And it’s coming in 2012, which hopefully will be a good election year for TV. But you don’t know about 2013, which in the cycle should be an off year.”

As Carroll says, established daytime talk shows — Dr. Phil, Ellen DeGeneres and Dr. Oz — have deals with stations that take them through 2013 or 2014, and have locked up the prime 4 p.m. time slot in most markets.

So, they’ll get first dibs at claiming what’s left of the 4 p.m. audience Oprah Winfrey captivated at that time for two decades and abandoned just last month so that she could pay more attention to her cable network, OWN, a joint venture with Discovery Communications.

Couric is likely to settle in at 3 p.m. in most markets. And the only reason 3 p.m. is available is because ABC is giving that network hour back to affiliates to program — essentially creating TV real estate that if not on the beach is then very close to it.

ABC’s eight owned stations have already said they will air Couric at 3 p.m., giving the show clearance in 23% of the country. Disney-ABC Domestic Syndication, which has the task of clearing the show throughout the rest of the country, hopes the ABC affiliates will follow the O&Os’ lead.

Of course, those affiliates may turn elsewhere. Rival syndicators are not likely to concede the 3 p.m. slot to Disney-ABC. They may come up with shows of their own.

Because the show will likely air at 3 p.m. (or even in the morning on some stations), syndicators can’t license the show for as much money as a 4 o’clock show, or charge advertisers as much.

There simply aren’t as many viewers, at least 10% fewer than at 4 p.m.

As one syndicator notes, Couric would “only be a lead-in to a news lead-in,” obviously not the most advantageous position. Still, most of the now-established talk shows grew up at 3 p.m., largely because stations didn’t want to air them against Winfrey at 4, or because they were contractually prohibited from doing so.

One general manager, who probably won’t be bidding for the show, says that shows in the 3 o’clock slot have a couple of advantages, especially when they’re new and stations get a deal. “No one is expecting as much as they do with a 4 o’clock show, and, if it’s successful, you can plan to move it if you get the chance.”

Couric’s real timing problem is that broadcasting isn’t what it used to be, even a few years ago.

The size of the broadcast daytime audience is smaller than in Winfrey’s prime, whittled away by scores of cable channels. Stations that once had rights to Winfrey’s show might have still enjoyed a larger news lead-in than their competitors, but for the last several years, they were paying dearly for it.

In the 1991-92 season, Winfrey averaged a 10 Nielsen rating. By the 2007-08 season, that number was about half. Last year, from September to July, she averaged a 4.4. This last season, filled with surprises and ginormous farewell guests, she averaged just above a 5.

Had Winfrey decided to continue after this year, “Stations would have told her ‘yes, but not for what you’ve been getting,’ ” says Carroll, “ I don’t know if that’s why Oprah decided to end in 2011, but I’m sure she was aware of it.”

Stations margins were killed by the recession and are just getting back to even keel, and though Winfrey was good to them for many of those years, they got stuck at the end.

They won’t do that again, especially for an unproven talk show. So the idea of Couric contending to become the “next Oprah” may make a nice headline on Entertainment Tonight, but it’s no more plausible than making that claim for Dr. Oz, which will take the 4 p.m. slot Winfrey had at dozens of stations this fall.