In most of America’s mind, ESPN is the reigning MVP of the sports world.
Their name is synonymous with televised sports, and SportsCenter remains the epicenter to a proper American morning & night ritual.
Despite all of these facts – the network has somehow lost subscribers in the past year.
Today, the Wall Street Journal cited Nielsen data that ESPN has lost 3.2 million subscribers in “a little over a year.” That story also says that the network’s cable subscription fee is about $6.61. If these numbers are accurate, that adds up to over $250 million per year in lost revenue.
In this day and age, however, its not really a surprise to hear that the cultural icon of ESPN has lost a certain amount of subscribers.
When you really think about it, networks such as CBS, ABC, and NBC have all hit their high-water marks in terms of viewers per show, and the two relate hand in hand. Back in the day there weren’t as many TV channels for the major networks to compete with, and its the same situation for ESPN today.
FoxSports 1 isn’t taking over their subscribers, it’s the internets fault; and you can’t really blame such a beautiful thing.
Nature will always prevail. It’s impossible to grow forever, and eventually competition will come along and eat some of your food.
But don’t get this twisted: ESPN isn’t going anywhere, anytime soon.
H/T TBL