beebs

5 minutes ago, kalbir said:

@beebs I took your 1990/91 season end ratings and updated the net differential for the 11 shows that were on from 1987/88 to 1990/91 and the new rankings are 

B&B +0.3

Y&R +0.1

As the World Turns -0.6

Guiding Light -0.8

Another World -1.1

Loving -1.1

All My Children -1.3

General Hospital -1.4

Santa Barbara -1.5

Days -1.7

One Life to Live -2.1

 

PHEW @ OLTL. That is embarrassing. DAYS' drop is almost as bad, but considering SB didn't have as far to fall, that's almost worse than OLTL. The Bell soaps are really the big winners here, and yet I don't really think most of the other soaps (especially outside the CBS shows) were emulating their formula to guide their way out of the rut they were in at this point. OLTL and GH would to some extent, but it took them years to figure out how to make it work within the heightened identities they'd created for the shows in the 80s. It's a big contrast to the almost-immediate jump to copy the outrageous style of Reilly when DAYS took off in the mid-90s.

An aside: 1990-91 is the first year since 1977-78 that ATWT finished higher than #5. Marland really held the show together during this period in a way that should truly be commended. They'll do even better in 1991-92.

End of season 1990-91 vs. 1989-90:

Really, the goal of 1990-91 was to try to hold steady. The fact ATWT is the big winner of the year simply by gaining 0.1 is telling of how things were going in this era. Another year of HUGE losses for OLTL, it's surprising it's taken ABC this long to ditch Rauch, considering they've dropped by a minimum of 0.5 every season since 1987-88, when they were at a 7.4 and #3. Despite Palumbo's middling writing, DAYS manages to tie for #6, no doubt their two summer events (J&J's wedding and Marlena and Roman's return) bolstering their numbers for the season.

AW does a great job of maintaining their numbers, but SB is less lucky. The Dobsons really botched their return, and I'll never understand writers' pretending a certain period of time never happened. SB realistically should've been able to flourish with NBCD stabilizing and GH sinking with Monty 2.0. GEN really didn't get a fair shake, considering they performed about as well as they had the previous two seasons, with only a minor ratings drop in the Fall of 1990 sealing their fate. It feels like NBC gave up on them the minute they debuted with such low ratings vs. Scrabble. A shame, really.

Y&R still stable, head and shoulders above everybody else. Their strength at least helping to keep CBSD's numbers stable, though B&B's relatively weak numbers not keeping eyeballs on the lineup across the daypart.

17 hours ago, kalbir said:

Y&R dominance will not be threatened until the aftermath of OJ when Reilly's Days blows up.

I'd make the argument that AMC's rise under McTavish in 1992-93 will definitely challenge Y&R's dominance, but it's definitely short-lived.

Just now, kalbir said:

Y&R February 5 Sheila has a miscarriage.

Y&R February 14 we saw during the classics. Kristoff St. John (RIP) debut.

Guiding Light Phillip and Beth get married. Grant Aleksander and Beth Chamberlin departure.

JEEZ Curlee really did clean house FAST upon her arrival!

4 hours ago, Gray Bunny said:

Currently, they are! They're back up in the 7's!  GH must really crash and burn in '91, similar to DAYS in '89. 

They definitely do, you'll see how bad it get by summertime, when they start to fall to the middle of the pack. I think the combination of Monty's failure, Rauch's OLTL tanking causing issues as their lead-in, and a resurgent GL under Curlee really combine to torpedo GH's fortunes.

9 hours ago, kalbir said:

@beebs I took your 1987/88, 1988/89, 1989/90 season end ratings and calculated the net differential for the 11 shows that were on all three seasons and they rank as follows

B&B +0.4

Y&R +0.1

General Hospital -0.7

As the World Turns -0.7

Guiding Light -0.7

Loving -0.7

All My Children -1.0

Another World -1.1

Santa Barbara -1.1

One Life to Live -1.4

Days -1.6

B&B showed growth and Y&R was stable. The rest dropped off.

Great work. And what's especially jarring is that all of GL's loss is from 1989-90. Most of ATWT's as well. All in all, CBS soaps' ratings really held up well during the late 80s, and it kinda surprising that GL would post such losses during what was, by all accounts, a very good year for the show, creatively.

NBC really lost its groove fast, losing by far the most, in general and relatively speaking. Unfortunately, shifting trends and circumstances kinda doomed them, after being surprisingly consistent during the mid-80s.

Loving's losses don't look so bad, until you realize they had a lot fewer viewers to lose.

34 minutes ago, kalbir said:

@beebs 1989/90 was the second season in a row Days had a huge drop. 1987/88 was 7.0, 1988/89 was 6.2, 1989/90 was 5.4. The supercouple era is ending with a whimper it seems.

to a great degree, yes. Though I've also keeping track of the summer periods (the period after Nielsen declares the season "over"). I suspect DAYS had a decent summer 1990 thanks to the Cruise Of Deception, which sort of....mitigated their decline for that period. But I would have to agree, two years of steady HUGE declines is shocking, really.

Season vs. season update:

Let's just be clear: this season was one of unequivocal collapse for nearly every show. The only soap to gain viewers is Generations (which, to @Khan's point, did break 3.0 a handful of times, once being its premiere week...barely). I do feel like the show was starting to build an audience during 1990, but this was just a rough year to launch a soap, and it never stood a chance under these circumstances. A slight ratings dip in the fall of 1990 sealed the deal, and by early 1991, GEN was done.

LOV held surprisingly steady during 1990. Can't recall what was happening on that show at the time, but apparently the viewers...didn't hate it as much as most other shows? AMC strengthening under Agnes Nixon's pen, though still unable to prevent some bleeding of viewers. Obviously Y&R and B&B had extremely strong years, nearly holding onto all of their previous season's audience. Can't underestimate Andrea Evans' departure on OLTL. That is one hell of a drop in one year, and worse is to come.

A tough year for most soaps, though things seemed to stabilize during Summer '89. Interesting to see the changing trends, as B&B and Y&R appear to be the real winners of the year, reflecting the shift away from the action-oriented style of the 80s.

Here's 1988-89 (vs. 87-88)

Seems like DAYS really sh*t the bed this year, with the combination of shifting tastes, Anne Howard Bailey's unsuccessful writing, Al Rabin's departure as EP (temporarily), Scrabble being replaced by a relatively weak Generations as its lead-in, and Y&R and B&B's ascent really wreaking havoc on the show. The fact the show reached as high as 8.1 and as low as 5.0 within about three and a half months shows just how quickly the wheels fell off. And while I recognize the holiday boost plays into that high, it's still a significant drop, considering how consistently well the show had been doing the previous year.

AMC seems to have the opposite situation happening. While it lost almost as many viewers as DAYS, they were struggling to build back their audience after the ratings crashed in the first half of 1988. Things don't pick up until Summer 1989 for them, with Felicia Menei Behr and Margaret DePriest tightening the ship through 1989, before Agnes Nixon returns in the fall.

Interesting to note that, though we've been talking a lot about GL's ratings troubles, it has stayed remarkably consistent the last three years, averaging a 6.0 and 7th place every year since 1986-87. Though Pam Long hasn't managed to move the needle upward at all during this period, she should be commended for at least maintaining stable numbers despite most soaps losing viewers over the past few seasons.

I should also note that, despite it being down slightly for the year, 1988-89 is the first year ATWT ranks 5th or higher since 1982-83. No doubt Marland was keeping the show on stable footing during this period.

1 hour ago, Gray Bunny said:

Dang, what happens to DAYS in the first half of '89?  Looking at the ratings on your page that begin in August '89, they're suddenly down in the low 5's. 

In short: Anne Howard Bailey.

A bit late to post this, as I've been out with COVID, but here's the 1987-88 season + summer figures vs. previous year.

 

There were a lot of gains made Post-IRAN Contra that got wiped out by the writers' strike, it seems. Most shows were trending up, but Summer 1988 was rough all around. Of course, we all know 1988-89 is gonna be rough on most soaps, but it's interesting to see the calm before the storm. Surprised to see ATWT trend downward when they were so solid storywise.

I see OLTL is starting to struggle after the goofy Old West story got bogged down and confused by the scab writers who couldn't decide if it was fantasy or reality. A real shame since they'd been in SUCH a strong position going into the strike.

Well, already I'm seeing an impact in that it is greatly impacting CBS' numbers negatively. B&B and GL are especially put in danger from this, with AW beating GL, and everyone but RH besting B&B multiple weeks. Obviously this shifts over time, but it has a very positive impact on ABC soaps.

Since we've now hit the beginning of the 1987-88 season, here's how 1986-87 panned out (vs. 1985-86)

GH and AMC really saw a steep decline this year, which, of course, impacted OLTL, but they were a much stronger show at this point and managed to hold their ground relatively well. Realistically, the name of the game this year was simply to lose as few viewers as possible, which was a challenge, especially during the summer pre-emptions thanks to Iran-Contra. ATWT held onto their previous year's numbers right up until the People Meters came in, and that made them lose ground vs. 85-86, but otherwise, they're among the strongest of the lot.

24 minutes ago, JAS0N47 said:

That's why I checked other weeks surrounding the missing week. So, out of the 72 ratings points that I checked, VR matches the Nielsen book for 70 of the 72 soaps (12 soaps a week x 6 weeks), only differing one tenth of a point for AW one week and two tenths of a point for YR another week. 

So getting 70 out of 72 ratings correct with the Nielsen book is a 97 percent success rate. She obviously didn't just "create" them out of nowhere, but had some sort of official ratings lists from somewhere. That's why I feel pretty confident for using the data for the week of 10/19/87 as a "placeholder" at least, until hopefully that Nielsen book is tracked down somewhere.

On a good note, there is a possible lead on one of the two "missing" books from 1991, so if we get that one, we will only need 1 week from 1981, 2 from 1987 (but we now have VR's ratings for one of those two weeks) and one from 1991 (the two from 1991 would just be getting us the additional info: Demos, Affiliates, Clearance, Preemptions) since we already have the ratings for those weeks from SOD.

So, if we add in VR's ratings for 10/19/87, that means we will only be missing ratings for just 2 weeks from 1979-Present (8/24/81 and 12/14/87).

The two differences I noticed actually both involve "breakouts": The AW 10/7/87 Wednesday broadcast is a breakout, 4.1 rating, not listed in the "normal" ratings. Same for the YR 11/18/87 Wed. broadcast, another breakout (this one 22 minutes long) with a 4.6 rating. By taking that low 4.6 rating out (for a third of the Wed. episode), that could have easily pushed YR's rating up two-tenths of a point as the Nielsen book has.

 

Perhaps the lists VR had access to were lists that had the ratings including those as "regular" episodes, before the network notified Nielsen to count them separately. It does add a little more credence to VR's data, at least in my opinion.

Fair point! I did notice a few more discrepancies than you did, as I have been following week by week with the data I have (which I copied into Excel as they were posting them), but you are correct that the numbers were almost always spot-on and in-line with what you have, so I don't mean to cast doubt over their work entirely, but just to point out that there are some differences here and there, usually with only one entry on a week. Your point about breakouts makes their data make a lot more sense as well.

10 minutes ago, JAS0N47 said:

Does anyone know who the poster VanessaReardon was? That person last posted in 2020, but posted complete weeks of Nielsen ratings for 1987. 

Luckily, one of the weeks posted is one of the missing weeks we need, 10/19/87-10/23/87. They posted most of 1987, but not December 1987, where we still need the week of 12/14/87-12/18/87.

Just wondered if anyone had contact info for that person. They posted some shares as well when soaps tied in the rankings, so it looks like maybe they have the shares that they could post for 10/19/87 too or might have the week of data we need for 12/14/87.

I joked that they were secretly Jill Farren Phelps (they became extremely defensive whenever anyone would disparage JFP's work as EP), but ultimately, no I don't think anyone ever confirmed/retained contact with them after they left. They were a somewhat...caustic personality. I've also caught some errors in their ratings posts (certain shows being either .1 up or down, usually...though I have found one or two instances of some rather major differences on certain shows), so while it's beneficial to have their data in the thread, we shouldn't take it as gospel either.

51 minutes ago, Soapsuds said:

Bold getting Capitol numbers was bad. ATWT numbers in that timeslot were much higher. CBS gave BB tons of time to gain viewership and iMO hurt ATWT and GL /entire CBS lineup.

Yeah, you notice almost instantly ATWT suffers from having B&B as its lead-in as opposed to Y&R. While I recognize there's a major drop-off in everyone's ratings, its impact on ATWT would likely have been lesser had they remained at 1:30, considering their ranking pre-vs. post B&B.

3 minutes ago, GLATWT88 said:

Pretty sure CBS was done with Capitol at this point and knew Bold would replace it soon. 

Absolutely, I remember seeing that the official cancellation notice came in December, so I'm sure folks behind the scenes could see the writing on the wall at this point.

Capitol's cancellation looking increasingly justified as SB begins to nip at their heels, and AW comfortably beating them most weeks. Granted it seems every CBS soap was trending downward that fall, but I suspect James Lipton's writing didn't help matters much.

For 1985-86 vs. 1984-85:

A generally positive year for many shows. GH and Y&R gaining back some viewers they'd lost in 1984-85, OLTL surging ahead thanks to Rauch/O'Shea. DAYS upward momentum continues, as the supercouple era really gets into gear. RoJohn/Marlena and the Pawn storyline were clearly a big hit.

Some weakness in AMC starting to appear, GL obviously being the biggest loser this year. AW, despite some minor ratings loss, begins to pull ahead of Capitol, and nearly occasionally beats GL. Too bad the momenutum wasn't sustained into 1987, despite both shows around it maintaining or gaining viewers. SB gained some major support, they're now more or less on par with the numbers TX got in the same slot their first year.

We watch soaps, but as they've said upthread, we relied mostly on imports, I think less due to financials rather than how easy it is to just air American and British soaps.

Y&R has always been HUGE here, helped by it airing a day ahead and in late afternoon (usually 4 or 4:30pm ET). As @kalbir said, AW was massive up here, and I read an article that also mentioned that Texas had also been a huge hit up here, topping the ratings for many weeks early on. I do remember AMC airing for many many years on CBC to great success (I believe CBC began carrying it in 1982, though it may have begun earlier), and EON for many years as well, though i couldn't tell you how successful it was. Global aired DAYS for decades as well, but that ended when the show went to Peacock. I believe it airs on cable now.

There's also a sizeable audience for British soaps, Coronation St. has been quite popular on CBC for years, and Emmerdale as well, to a lesser extent.

We've made attempts of our own, obviously. I remember reading that CBC Radio aired a version of Search For Tomorrow in 1957, with DAYS' Corrine Conley playing Jo. As far as I know, it's still in their archive. Obviously we tried again on TV with High Hopes in the 70s, but again, nothing long-term. I think our biggest problem was that we didn't jump on the train early enough on, relying so heavily on American shows, it's quite a missed opportunity.

8 minutes ago, JAS0N47 said:

6/9/86-6/13/86: Frightened of Roman, who threw a temper tantrum, Carrie ran into the street and was struck down by a speeding car. Kimberly was relieved when Victor dropped his custody suit over Andrew. Bo and Hope moved into Victor's mansion and Bo allowed Victor to try to be a father to him in exchange for Victor's promise that he would stop harassing the Brady clan. Kimberly was surprised when Shane said he wants to marry her before she and Andrew move in with him. The mystery man kept tabs on Eugene, whose attempts to build a time machine have so far been a bomb. Robin and Mike shared kisses over a romantic dinner. Jennifer tried to help her friend Matt, who is hooked on drugs. Lars secretly contacted Britta. Liz dropped her lawsuit against Pete because she feels Savannah's to blame for Tod's death. Emma continued working on her baby adoption plot. Chris smooched with Savannah. Shawn is feuding with Bo.

6/16/86-6/20/86: Marlena fell off a ledge after saving Jennifer's drugged boyfriend Matt from committing suicide. Savannah began undermining Liz and Neil's marriage. Emma plotted the kidnap and sale of Kimberly's baby. Bo accepted a job as manager of one of Victor's companies. Victor ordered Patch to secretly keep an eye on Bo. Patch, who's smitten with Kayla, found it difficult to follow Emma's orders to terrorize Kayla. Roman worked hard to gain Carrie's confidence as she recovered after being hit by a car. Shawn and Caroline reconciled. Shane and Bo are pretending to be on the outs to get inside info on Victor. Hope is angry over Bo's sudden devotion to Victor. Lars and Melissa are developing a friendship. Mike was jealous of newcomer, Mitch, who's taken a shine to Robin.

 

6/23/86-6/27/86: Disguised as a nurse, Emma kidnapped Andrew from the hospital nursery. Neil operated on Marlena, who suffered from head injuries from her fall off the window ledge. Suspecting that she might be pregnant, Hope wouldn't agree to pose as Shane's childless wife as part of his scheme to see if a baby seller has Andrew. Roman rejoined the police force. Mike and Mitch, who has the approval of Robin's father, vied for Robin's attention. Shane reluctantly agreed to let Kimberly pose as his wife when he questions adoption agencies in hopes of finding Andrew. Hope was furious at Bo, who refused to help Shane look for Andrew because Bo suspects that Victor might be behind the kidnapping. Bo is sure that Victor can lead him to Andrew. Melissa is confused by her growing feelings for Lars. Savannah continued her plot to get revenge against Liz. Roman fretted that Marlena might die.

 

http://www.jason47.com/days/episodesummaries.html

Ah there you go, much like in '78 when Don fell off a ledge trying to save Donna, the easiest way for this show to get a quick ratings boost is to throw someone off a tall building, apparently.

4 hours ago, Gray Bunny said:

Just outta curiosity, when did the infamous Henderson flood of Search for Tomorrow air? Around February/March?  If so, it didn't do much for them. 

It was, and...yeah. For all the hype it was supposed to give them, it essentially amounted to a few weeks above 3.0 and that's it? Kinda sad, really.

Wild to see Loving so competitive at this stage, coming so close to beat AW, especially knowing how this truly is as good as it's gonna get for them. Were the stories really that strong at the time, or was it just them being buoyed by the uptick of ABCD in general?

Okay, so Season + Summer numbers for 1984-85 (vs. previous year):

A truly rotten year for everyone except SB and LOV, though NBC generally came away relatively unscathed. In RH vs. LOV's case, I would expect that the numbers would be more or less reversed if they'd not moved timeslots, which would have made RH's drop seem far less jarring. ATWT definitely needed a new headwriter at this point, truly not surprised Marland was brought on shortly after this.

As I think I mentioned upthread, this is the first year that VCRs truly took off, so I imagine some of the drop off in viewership is down to that, plus the upturn in the economy meaning more folks are out of the house during the day.

1 hour ago, j swift said:

Just for my own peace of mind, it bears repeating that weekly changes in ratings are 95% more likely due to chance than any singular variable.

The speculation and nostalgia is fun, but it lacks logical coherence with basic statistical principles. 

For the record, my mind was already at peace with this info, so as much as I understand where you're coming from, it did come off a little...patronizing. We generally are looking at trends, and the trend IS downward at this point. There was an earlier post about increase in VCR usage around this time, which I think explains a lot of the downturn in daily viewership (obviously among other factors).

I think if we can't have a little fun with tying the numbers to the creative processes of the shows, then what are we even doing in this thread?