Advertising On Television

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30739, 1 May 1965, Page 14

Advertising On Television

Sir, Congratulations to “C.C.” for the article on television advertising and the general excellence of this weekly feature. Without reopening the subject, could you obtain from the N.Z.B.C. a statement on advertising policy? When first introduced, commercials, we were told, would be shown in natural breaks, and an example illustrated how a single advertisement would be inserted between features or parts of a feature. Commercials would be shown only on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays and in the latter half of Wednesday’s programme—that is, for half the total transmitting time. On Easter Monday, commercials were shown during a soccer match, six minutes of the second half, including part of the last exciting 10 minutes, being lost. When close holidays have fallen on commercial nights, advertising has been transferred to a free night, so the N.Z.8.C., with disregard for the paying viewer, has it both ways.— Yours, etc., ! ABELSON. ; April 23, 1965.

[The commercial manager of the N.Z.B.C. (Mr W. R. M. Shaw) replies: “There has been no change of commercial television policy since its inception; in the interests of the paying viewer the majority of commercials are shown at the beginning and end of each programme, and rather fewer in natural breaks of a feature. The illustration shown some years ago of how a commercial would be inserted was merely an example, and any thought that only one commercial would be so placed is a misintepretation. The policy remains constant that commercials are shown in half the weekly transmission time. Thus an additional three hours’ transmission of the afternoon of Easter Monday carried commercials spread over 1J hours. No commercials were shown during the regular transmission on Monday night. There are only two ‘close’ holidays (Anzac Day and Christmas Day) which can fall on the commercial days, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursday, and Saturdays. When this occurs, commercials are transferred to ‘free’ nights, but surely the N.Z.B.C. does not have it ‘both ways’ since viewers have exactly the same hours of transmission and the same number of commercials during the week.”]