WHAT WAS THE IMPACT OF REOPENING ON U.S. TV VIEWING?

As some states reopen their communities after more than three months of abiding to stay-at-home restrictions, others continue to abide by the regulations. Comscore presented a report on how the Covid-19 pandemic and social distancing increased video consumption and television viewing starting in mid-March 2020. The research market chose markets that represent three different stays at home levels - Orders in Place, Orders Lifted, and no orders, which we refer to as Order Nevers, generally placed at for free at the state level and created for local differences. The firm analyzed sets in Use (SIU) levels across TV markets and categories, which show the number of TV sets in the market that are tuned to a linear TV station or channel during the week on a 24-hour average.

As predicted, all three categories experienced increased viewership at the beginning of March 2020, whether they were subjected to stay at home orders or not, with peaks during the week of 23rd March 2020. However, an all weekly Sets In Use (SIU) comparison to the week of 10th February 2020 to create a more reasonable comparison, there are identifiable differences between the groups. Big cities, such as New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Detroit consistently had higher viewing levels, which saw a slight decline from the peak week of 23rd March 2020 and peaked from the week of 30 March 2020 through the week of 27 April 2020. 

National trends seem to correlate, rising to a higher relative viewing level. Markets where orders were lifted also followed this pattern with lower relative viewing levels and declines starting during the week of 27 April 2020. Though viewership across these categories is higher than during the week of 10th February 2020, Order Never markets have almost reached the SIU levels seen in February 2020, making them the fastest group to do so, with the Orders Lifted markets being not too far behind. Markets with orders still in place continue to have the highest relative viewing levels compared to 10th February 2020.

Comscore also analyzed the week of 27th April, with Columbia dropping by 4% and Nashville dropping 9%. On the contrary, Atlanta continued to receive higher viewing levels relative to the week of 10th February 2020 and while there has been a drop-off since the week of April 27th, the market still retains viewing levels that are 9% higher than during the pre-Covid times, while Nashville is almost back to normal viewing levels, and Columbia follows close behind.

While SIU levels began declining due to the season change, the evaluated markets remained at levels on average 14% higher than where they were at for each market last year. Columbia, SC, and Nashville had lower relative peaks in viewing levels as compared to Atlanta in regards to” Orders Lifted” markets like Columbia, SC, Atlanta, and Nashville, there are some definite nuances to the viewing levels. Both Columbia, SC, and Atlanta lifted their stay at home orders during the week of 20th April 2020, Columbia on April 20th and Atlanta on 24th April, while Nashville reopened on 27th April 2020.