ESPN President John Skipper, speaking at a conference last week, said pay-TV companies need to offer smaller bundles of channels to attract people who aren’t paying for cable or satellite service, reports Bloomberg.
Skipper said as many as 8 million young Americans are looking for TV programming, and pay-TV operators should target those viewers. ESPN would want to be part of smaller packages, which would cost less than bigger bundles.
Viewers buying smaller bundles would likely eventually trade up, the story adds.
I agree, but Skipper’s recommendation doesn’t go far enough. Want to create cheap packages so “young Americans” can get ESPN? Well, start by UNbundling ESPN from every package that’s offered.
If you want to pay for sports, if you want to help support the ridiculous salaries paid to some professional athletes, I say go ahead and pay for the privilege. Right now, the rest of us who enjoy cable/satellite television HAVE no choice in the matter…
I would drop ESPN in a heartbeat if I could, along with lots of other channels that I don’t want to pay for. So if Skipper wants to make it easier to GET ESPN, he should also make it easier to DROP ESPN.