Paramount Sticks With Smaller-Meeting Upfront Strategy

Paramount Global is again thinking small for this year's upfronts, eschewing Carnegie Hall — where CBS has made glitzy presentations in years past — in favor of a series of more-intimate meetings with buyers and advertisers.

While most other media companies returned to impressive venues like Radio City Music Hall the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center after COVID-19, Paramount decided to approach the annual ad-sales bazaar differently.

Paramount has apparently decided that last year’s meetings were received positively and the immersive format deepens its connections with advertisers.

Meetings will be held in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.

Also Read: Paramount Finishes Upfront With Gains in Digital, Programmatic

Already this year A+E has said it will be holding a virtual upfront in March–as it has the past couple of years.

Warner Bros Discovery, on the other hand, will be returning to The Theater at Madison Square Garden for its usually star studded event.

Last year’s upfronts were a bit muted because of picketing by the Writers Guild of America, which was on strike, and because SAG-AFTRA members did not appear at the presentations in support of the writers and would also go on strike shortly thereafter. Both work stoppages were settled in the fall.

Netflix, for example, had planned to take CBS’s Wednesday-evening time slot during upfront week, but scrapped its live event because of the writer’s strike and concerns about confrontations with picketers.

The strikes made it hard for the networks to say when scripted programs would be returning to the schedule. Many shows are still just starting to come online months after the start of the traditional broadcast season.