Why the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show Will No Longer Air on Network TV

Parent company L Brands' chief executive announced and explained the decision in a company memo.

It's been six months since L Brands' chief marketing officer Ed Razek made trans- and fat-phobic comments about what he felt is a justified lack of inclusivity in the annual Victoria's Secret Fashion Show — comments that had many people declaring the mall-ubiquitous lingerie brand canceled. And now, the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show as we know it is, for all intents and purposes, actually canceled. According to a company memo, parent company L Brands has decided to no longer air the over-the-top runway show on network television.

The New York Times reports that, on Friday, employees were informed by L Brands' chief executive Leslie Wexner that Victoria's Secret has been "taking a fresh look at every aspect of our business," reaching the conclusion that the brand "must evolve and change to grow." And apparently, that means yoinking the bouncy, sparkly undies fest off ABC and CBS (the two networks it has aired on since its 2001 premiere).

“With that in mind, we have decided to re-think the traditional Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show,” Wexner reportedly wrote in the memo. “Going forward we don’t believe network television is the right fit.” It's unclear if the fallout from Razek's tone-deaf comments played a role in the decision to remove the show from the land of sitcoms and nightly news, but it's safe to say falling viewership probably did. According to the Times, the audience dropped by about two-thirds in the last five years.

Fans of the show need not despair. The memo apparently said Victoria's Secret would develop "a new kind of event" that would somehow be transmitted to eager eyes on a different platform in the future, but Wexler didn't say how far in the future — or any other details, for that matter.


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Originally Appeared on Allure