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2.66m watch 2012 Melbourne Cup

Ratings: Melbourne Cup 2012 pips the numbers for 2011 and rides home as one of the biggest audiences of the year.

A whopping 2.66m viewers watched Green Moon win the 2012 Melbourne Cup yesterday -just pipping the 2.65m who watched in Dunaden’s 2011 win.

The number is one of the biggest audiences of 2012, just behind the State of Origin decider.

Seven strategically coded its broadcast into various segments, just as most broadcasters do for key sporting events. The number doesn’t include all the other Aussies who were gathered around TV sets in bars and offices (Update: including regionals it was 3.59m). Nor does it contribute to Seven’s primetime share, which begins at 6pm. But it does help drive viewers into primetime.

Seven Network won with a 31.9% share, then Nine 23.8%, TEN 20.8%, ABC 17.0% and SBS 6.6%.

Aside from the 2.66m who watched The Race, the other numbers for Cup coverage were Presentation: 1.95m, Mounting Yard: 1.63m, Late: 927,000 and Early: 665,000. Other Seven numbers were The X Factor (1.54m), Seven News (1.33m), Winners and Losers (1.25m), Today Tonight (1.19m), Home and Away (990,000), Deal or No Deal (601,000), Once Upon a Time (394,000) and Smash (136,000).

Nine News (1.13m) led for Nine then Big Bang (1.01m / 854,000), ACA (982,000), Big Brother (967,000), 2 Broke Girls (694,000), Hot Seat (635,000), Two and a Half Men (516,000), Mike and Molly (357,000) and Survivor (187,000).

NCIS (849,000) was best for TEN. Modern Family was 696,000, TEN News was 633,000, Jamie’s 15 Minute Meals was 612,000 / 605,000, NCIS: LA was 602,000, The Project 6pm was 392,000 and TEN Late News was 300,000.

ABC News hit 1.12m for ABC1 then 7:30 (829,000), Foreign Correspondent (649,000), Obama: What Happened to Hope? (470,000) and First Tuesday Book Club (292,000).

56 Up was strong for SBS ONE on 403,000 then Insight (260,000), World News Australia (188,000) and Dateline (139,000).

Neighbours led multichannels with 292,000.

Tuesday 6 November 2012
Amended.

26 Responses

  1. David, do you agree that the 7 cup carnival is not worth it because they have to broadcast the other days?

    Personally i clearly think this is a profitable venture considering the bunched advertising, all the product placement throughout the coverage and the betting money they recieve from sponsors like TAB.

  2. seven have mastered the integration of branded content into its broadcast. It’s a seamless transition of infomercials from TAB, Swiss, First Choice liquor etc etc

  3. @Hoin oh and also you would much rather if you where Ch9 the cup carnival than all the other days they have that dont rate well. So a very incorrect comment really.

  4. The work they’ve done on the footage from the previous ‘Up’s’ looks fabulous.Obviously been digitised and restored over the 7 years since 49 Up. Great show, pity more people didnt watch.

  5. @Hoin…what a crock..7 wouldnt care about Oaks Day…its a thursday during the day…they are not sacraficing anything. All their advertising is bundled into packages and they make alot of money on the horse racing every year so your very wrong.

    I am a big horse racing person. Love TVN but I have enjoyed Ch7’s coverage it has been excellent and brings a different angle to the event. The only problem I have is that 7 only show mounting yard for some races (like 5/10) , they should allow TVN do the mounting yard when they decided not to so we dont miss out. Apart from that very happy

  6. Just on 56 Up – I’m surprised, and not a little disappointed that it can’t make the top 20. I wonder if it had been on ABC1 if that would have made a difference in viewer numbers.

  7. Winners & Losers probably got a healthy boost from people tuning in for the Oz Lotto draw, be interesting to know if the numbers dropped off after the draw went to air in the first ad break.

  8. Unbelievable 7 (Melb) Has the Melbourne Cup with 1.35 million viewers (Melb) and they still can’t beat 9 News (Melb). 373 viewers – 9 News (Melb) 431 viewers.
    They have not won a week in Melbourne. Say’s alot for the head newsreader – Peter Mitchell. His not winning Monday-Thursady and Sunday nights. Change news presenter’s. Our family will stick with 9 News a regular part of our evening. Congrat’s 9 News!!

  9. David, 56Up was Daily Pick last week. I think mv is saying that they didn’t know that there was another ep last night (and one more next week). SBS didn’t say anything about it at the end of the first ep so I was also unsure and had to check (altho’ I suspected as they had only shown about a third of the subjects).

    mv, good luck with the SBS catchup service as, for me, it is horrible. It stops every few minutes and I have to refresh. Allow about 1½ hours for an hour program. No, it’s not my internet connection, browser, flash, etc.

  10. Agree that Matt Doran should anchor late news permanently. Hamish Macdonald seems so clinical and has the personality of a piece of cardboard. Those figures are very good and congrats ch10.

    Regarding Oaks day, surely it will rate better than anything else all day, and surely is viable when you look at the complete package of the contract. Not surprised ch9 would just want the main event, they’ve never been a network to give something back to the viewer.

  11. I’m surprised with the ten late news number, why wouldn’t ten decide to put that team in the breakfast slot as well and scrap kiwi Henry and the others on breakfast tv or is ten being dumb, however I’d still watch Sunrise.

  12. I didn’t know there was another 56 up on! Annoyed that my foxtel iq wouldn’t series link it so i just assumed only one episode!! (as i haven’t had a chance to watch first one yet).

    I guess I will have to watch on sbs on demand.

  13. Jezza, Whilst 2.5 million is a large single channel figure, the combined people watching TV was less than 3 million.
    Over in Primetime (1800-2230) there were more than 5 million watching.
    Primetime (night-time) always has more overall TV viewers.

  14. Seven might be celebrating the ratings for the Melbourne Cup but they’ll be gnashing their teeth in frustration tomorrow when they have to throw away a whole day on Oaks Day.

    Channel Nine has never wanted the Melbourne Cup because the contract states that the Melbourne Cup broadcaster has to also show Oaks Day in its entirety.

  15. Just a comment about so called ‘prime time’. I guess this is when most people gather around their tv sets to watch. So when the Melbourne Cup is on surely prime time shifts to when there are over 2.5 million people watching as opposed to the standard 6pm-1030pm? Advertisers/sponsers will be paying much more for Melb Cup spots than 9.36pm on the night?

    Thoughts anyone

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