Variety: Fox Sees New Ad Dollars for Sports, News, Streaming in Latest Upfront Close

Story from Variety:

Fears that Trump tariffs would dampen TV’s annual “upfront” advertising market appear to have been overblown — at least for those media companies with a strong sports portfolio.

Fox Corp. won new dollars to its sports schedule, Tubi streaming service and Fox News operations during the current “upfront” market, according to the company, which has wrapped the majority of its negotiations. During this annual period, U.S. media companies look to secure the bulk of the ad dollars Madison Avenue will commit to their next cycle of programming.”

“The Fox portfolio of industry leading Sports, News and Entertainment content delivered double-digit revenue growth in the Upfront for the second year in a row,” said Jeff Collins, president of advertising sales, marketing and brand partnerships for Fox Corp., in a prepared statement. “Unprecedented audience growth across the Fox portfolio has driven better outcomes for our trusted client partners. We thank them for their continued commitment and remain dedicated to making every second of their investment with us count.” Fox saw the bulk of its growth from consumer-products giants, pharmaceutical marketers and financial-services firms.

The volume of dollars put behind sports programming rose by a double-digit percentage, according to people familiar with negotiations, exceeding $2 billion overall, not including the World Cup, which did not take place last year, but for which Fox has U.S. rights in 2026. Advertisers raised the volume of dollars committed to Tubi by 35%, these people said.

Programming from the company’s Fox News Media secured a volume increase in the double-digit percentage range, according to these people, as advertisers followed the larger audiences viewing Fox News Channel. Fox News saw the number of traditional advertisers on its roster rise, these people said.

Like NBCUniversal, which revealed robust upfront results last week, Fox benefitted from a broad sports portfolio that includes one of the medium’s most-watched Sunday NFL broadcasts as well as next year’s World Cup and post-season Major League Baseball games. Sports has been key to the ad-sales game so far this year. There is no other programming format that continues to dependably generate the large, simultaneous viewing audiences that advertisers and distributors crave.

TV networks favor the upfront market because it allows them to build support for their programs well ahead of their debut. Still, the advertising bazaar has been tougher to navigate in recent years as more people gravitate to streaming video and other means of accessing their favorite programs, movies, news and sports events.

Ad commitments for the most recent cycle of primetime broadcast TV fell 3.5% in 2024’s upfront market, to $9.34 billion, according to Media Dynamics Inc., while commitments for primetime on cable tumbled 4.8%, to $9.065 billion. Meanwhile, ad commitments to streaming video hubs rose a noticeable 35.3%, hiking to $11.1 billion from $8.2 billion in the previous market. The amount committed to streaming video for the most recent TV season was greater than that devoted to primetime broadcast or primetime cable — a first for the industry.