Tuesday, September 12, 2017

U.S. TV Antenna Households Increase to Nearly 16 Million Homes

One sign that consumers are unbundling their video entertainment purchases is the increase in purchasing and use of over-the-air antennas, presumably then combined with subscriptions to one or more streaming services.

A study sponsored by Ion Media and conducted by Nielsen shows the number of broadcast-only homes has increased 41 percent over the last five years, to 15.8 million households.

That shift, in turn, is part of a larger rearrangement of buying preferences in the video entertainment business, which has consumers shifting buying to over-the-top streaming services, reducing or halting the buying of linear services and use of streaming services.

The report finds that broadcast-only homes have a higher percentage of young viewers (median age 34.5) than total TV households (39.6).

Some 39 percent of broadcast-only homes have children in the household, compared to 34 percent of total TV households.

The new reliance on over-the-air antennas is part of a range of other trends including a shift to mobile video, cord cutting of linear video subscriptions, a shift to skinny bundles and use of streaming services.

The shift to use of over-the-air TV is related to a larger problem in the communications business, namely the process whereby products and services become features. In the case of broadcast TV, the shift if from paying for a linear video subscription that also includes the local off-air channels, to buying an antenna to avoid paying for such content access.

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