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Matt White questions lack of promotion around 10 Cup carnival

"The message hasn't got out there at all," says former 10 Head of Sport.

It’s not often a former Head of Sport speaks out about his former broadcaster’s coverage.

Speaking on his SEN sports program on Thursday, Matt White described his former job at 10 as “an absolute privilege and pleasure” and said “there’s not a person who’s working on that, who doesn’t try their absolute hardest.”

But he was far more blunt about the ratings performance. While the Melbourne Cup topped Tuesday viewing at 1.21m viewers, it was down on 2020’s 1.41m metro viewers.

“The simple bottom line is that the numbers are going down. Now, let me give you part of the reason why,” he said.

“When it comes to promotion around this, there’s no question that Channel Seven have now 52 weeks of racing, and that’s where everybody goes. I was getting texts from people who were saying, ‘I completely forgot on Derby Day, I was watching the Golden Eagle on Seven …hoping to see the Derby …and I just totally forgot.'”

White said a lack of promotion was at the heart of the problem.

“It’s very, very clear that the message hasn’t got out there at all. If you take a look at what Seven has to start their promotion, for instance, in the morning, you’ve got 300,000 odd people watching Sunrise. 316,000 people yesterday. So you start promoting that through Sunrise, for instance, and you are well ahead of the game.

“What has 10 got? Studio 10… average there, 40,000 people. 40,000 So you’re behind the 8 ball already. That’s if you are promoting it, then you get to your news, for instance. Seven News last night, 1.03 million people tune in to watch Seven News. 10 News, 340,000. How are you going to start promoting things there and get your message across?”

Matt White, who departed 10 in May 2020, added, “It’s got to work with complete and utter promotion from those in charge. Not integration. Not keeping everybody happy. Promotion. Letting everybody know what you’ve got, where you’ve got it, when it is and why you should watch.”

10 declined to comment.

14 Responses

  1. a 200,000 drop is easily explained by the fact that Melboune has come out of lockdown this November, and there was one of the shortest price favourites in years. White is just attacking Ten because now works for a competitor. The Melbourne Cup is 5 minutes of TV on one channel.

  2. The Melbourne Cup rights deal is a dud deal in my view due to lack of exclusivity. Go back a decade or thereabouts and the free to air broadcaster had exclusive live rights over the big race while Sky Racing could not show the race until after it finished.

    Now there’s two free to air broadcasters (Ten and Racing.com) and Sky Racing is allowed to show it live, plus every betting app has either Racing.com or Sky Racing streaming in it, and Sky Racing is on all of Foxtel’s streaming platforms.

    All of that choice, combined with very few viewers are going to pay attention to the commercial break on either side of the race, it seems like a poor investment unless you have other racing to showcase to be a “home” of racing, and Ten don’t.

    1. If 7 concentrate on Syd and Bris every Sat on the main channel (in lieu of Mel) and maintain their Mel, Adel and Country Vic coverage on 68/78 as per the contract, you have no FTA double ups and 5 meetings will get national coverage on a Sat.

  3. Totally agree with Matt White, Chanel 10 have no idea on promoting or selling a program to their audience. If Kerry Packer was still around, he would broom Studio 10, rework the news, employ writers and real voice people to sell & deliver programs…..if I remember righty Kerry went with his gut feeling on new shows, and guess what? He was 100% correct everytime….
    Chanel 10 is missing soul.

  4. Or maybe more people have come to the conclusion that horse racing is cruel and I find it disgusting that it is even broadcast on TV. a child should not be subjected to an animal dying on National TV

  5. I’ll give you another reason. Horse Racing shouldn’t exist (greyhounds too). It’s cruelty to animals and people are starting to wake up. It should be banned. Too many horses die on the track each and every year and are only bred into existence for a sole purpose, money. There is no excuse for it.

  6. Seriously! This constant talking down of 10 is getting beyond a joke! Let’s remember that there are real people that have jobs at this network/organization , we should be all trying to ensure that we have a viable and diverse tv industry in this country, and not be dictated by a small cohort .

    1. I think it’s worth remembering that Matt White was speaking on SEN which is a dedicated sports audience, so while many of them may be familiar with Racing.com I’d suggest the broader audience is not. The drop in numbers is similar to most across FTA. But worth filing when a former Head of Sport comments on their former…

  7. I would think the answer is that people were simply watching 68/78. Its a dedicated racing channel that does the product justice. It wasn’t a 6 hour advertorial for fashion whilst also being filled with way too many ads. Whilst the once a year punters would have tuned in, the presentation was simply way below par to a rusted on punter, who now has a far better option…

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