I think it's safe to assume that they've settled into their spot. It will probably fall closer to 2.5 after the Chicago pre-emptions are included, but 2.5 is about what they are averaging..And, the demo's seem to be going up a bit. If those demo's keep rising then I think season 10 just my end up happening..

From the CW:

* Smallville climbed to it’s best adults 18-49 (1.2/4), adults 18-34 (1.2/5-tie) and total viewers (2.6mil) of the season.
* This also marks our best performance in the time period in those categories since Sept. 08 (last Smackdown telecast).
* Smallville was #1 in the hour among men 18-34 (1.4/6) and men 18-49 (1.4/5).

SV's biggest problems with these ratings is that they are relying on gimmicks. When we had all Lame and Kan't all the time, they fell to 2.2. It was only with Ollie/Chloe/other DC characters taking over did the show achieve the 2.5 area. If next year there is an Ollie spinoff of, of any sort, and AM leaves, which she says she is planning on doing, the best they start out with is a 2.2, if that.

DO and the network, along with PSP, also understand this. Nois and Clunk won't work, because so far, it hasn't.

If Ollie fans and AM 's fans,leave after this season, you get a 2.0, most likely, to even start the season.

As for adults and men watching, doesn't matter. Didn't matter for wrestling, which did almost twice as well, won't help SV, unless DO is desperate, or SV does much much better ratings wise, which is hasn't.

Since this is sweeps, we should see another rise in ratings, considering it is gimmick central now at SV. But sooner or later they have to go back to the ratings loser that is ED/Nois. There isn't much of a choice.

I will be interested to see the finals next week, though doesn't tvbythenumbers show them weekend? I can't remember.

Yes it does.

Here's what I don't understand. Why does the CW issue a press release about the success of Crossfire's preliminary ratings when they know that a chunk of that audience(the Chicago area) were watching sports? Doesn't seem fair.

In the end it is just a game. The CW wants to impress now, and if the numbers go down, that no one will remember of care by the beginning of next week. Like the american electorate, they are hoping the press and stock holders have short term memories.

As their press release for VD and SPN yesterday shows, women are always at the top of the heap on the CW. Adults might matter, but women matter more. Smackdown got canceled for bringing in the boys.

The CW will spin any positive news it can - after the utter, complete failure of The Beautiful Life, it needs to. But the CW has not yet switched from Ann Taylor to Men's Warehouse, and as Dawn is the former head of Lifetime, it seems rather unlikely that it will as long as she's in charge.



Considering over three million people live in Chicago, and it's my understanding that Chicago typically has a lot of SV watchers (thus making up for the size difference between it and NYC) there should be a noticeable dip come Monday.



Yes, and it typically slip-slides through Feb Sweeps, and even lower into May Sweeps. The only reason it built an audience last year was because of KK's fans tuning in for her guesting -- and that major push in women (see the press release for Power) is what got Smallville renewed. KK isn't coming back this year, and DC people skew male (Toyman in 9.04, Mia here in 9.06) not female making Dawn's elusive demo farther away.

Hang on, the CW did NOT issue a press release. From TV By the Numbers:



Someone questioned this in the comments, and they clarified:



Smallville either didn't do well enough to justify promotion to their advertisers (note that it did well in M18-34, and if it did well in W18-34 they surely would have mentioned it, but they didn't), or they know the final numbers will go down and don't want to look foolish later. Of course, there could be a press release later (or it could get mentioned in their press release for the overall week), but right now, they have NOT issued a press release. TV By the Numbers was very clear on that. This is aimed solely at the fans, not at the advertisers.

Robert also said this:

the people who matter (advertisers) aren’t likely paying attention on a Halloween Saturday. Generally the impact of one single market outside of a huge football game does not have any big impact. I doubt the Bulls game will have much impact and the way things go with the finals adjustments, things often move around a tenth in either direction even when there are no local market pre-emptions

Bill added this:

Smallville is doing more than “OK” on Friday’s, it has a higher 18-49 ratings average vs. its network’s overall 18-49 average than any other show on Friday night.

For the CW, Smallville is doing *great* on Fridays.

Thanks for clarifying EllyF. It makes more sense now.

Don't you just love it when mediocrity in terms of ratings is considered "Great". Yeah, its getting a decent # compared to past shows on the network on Fridays. Guess what, those shows were canceled. So the 18-49 M is #1, yeah, so was Smackdown, where is that on CW now. It may be good for CW on Friday, but that doesn't mean its good. With DVR viewership included the show is almost 1.5-2 million behind where was at last fall. Did all 2 million of those viewers not get the memo on friday move or did they just say, you know what Smallville isn't a priority so I won't catch it. If Smallville does get a 10th season it will because Dawn just doesn't have anything else to put in place.

BTW, This 2.60 is even less than the overnight rating for Echo which was a 2.62, so this isn't uncharted territory for the season. The fact that Legendary Clois Kiss couldn't get it any higher can't be a good sign for huge increases going forward. I figure it will sit in the 2.4-2.6 rating territory til the winter break. After that, who knows what will happen, you would expect it to decrease like usual, but the Friday night slot could be a wild-card. It may just stay pretty much the same since competition not as tough as Wednesday's & Thursday were.

18-49 year olds really do not matter; they are better than 60 year olds, for sure, but as with their last press release time and time again it was the W18-34 and A18-34 that they hyped up. To Dawn, only college-aged kids and recent grads matter, and they only really matter if they are girls.

If SV is skewing better in the 18-49 year old grouping vs. the rest of the network, and it skewing in the 18-49's better than it's 18-34's, then all that means is that Smallville is skewing old, which again isn't something Dawn wants in her young, female oriented netlet.

If anything, the pattern I've seen with Smallville's rating "rise" is that once they started promoting the DC guest starts for the last three episodes with Toyman, Roulette, and Mia -- old men started watching the series. Which as the VD's press release that was doing cartwheels over their all time network high in ladies 18-34, isn't a boon for Dawn.



Correct; NYC was 6% of all ratings, and I think Chicago is either 3 or 4. With ratings in the low 2mil range, even that slight percentage can really effect things, which is probably no press release. If there is anything they think they can spin out of SV's first night of sweeps, we should hear about it Monday.

I'm going to repost this from my LJ because the math part is complicated but this is what went down. The WGN in Chicago is about 4% of total Chicagoan viewers and that's about 4% of 3,070,000 nielsen families (from 2008 estimates). I guestimated how far it would be conservatively guessed to fall for the market exempted due the Bulls:

4% of 3,070,000 = 122,800

2,600, 000 - 122,800 = 2,477,200 which, when compared to Roulette (2, 466,000) is about 0.45% increase

Now, remember, I did this with a 2008 population estimate. Other online figures have found it at about 3.5 million and that would be actually a 140,000 viewer decrease if 3.5 million is closer to the accurate audience.
****

Second, I compared the JUST overnight gain (no pre-empts) gain for SV from pre-sweeps week to the first sweeps week with the overnights in VD and SPN from pre-sweeps week to sweeps week:

Let's make an impossible assumption, considering the Bulls' Game, but let's just assume to be Devil's Advocate that there is no decline. It stays flat (yes, I know it's not possible, go with this). At best in some AU, SV can do an increase from Roulette (2,466,00) to Crossfire (2,600,000) of 134,000 or about 5.2% .

Now, again, we all know this is NOT possible cause they will take out whatever the Bulls' viewers amount is. However, just for argument, let's say that SV managed a 5.2% increase from Roulette to Sweeps.

Let's compare to Vampire Diaries and SPN:

Vampire Diaries was 3,863,000 (pre sweeps) /4,307,000 (sweeps) * 100 = 10.31% INCREASE or about double the impossible gain SV would magically make.

Even SPN, which has been slumping lately did:
2,647,000 (pre sweeps)/2,921,000 (sweeps) * 100 = 9.4% increase or a little LESS than double what SV would do even if the Bulls were not a concern.
***
Finally, I think it might be possible that the exemptions do matter. We're talking here about the 3rd largest market for SV viewing in the country as well as the 3rd largest market total. It's the bulls in the week of playoffs. The week Metallo aired, it was pre-empted in NYC for a Mets game and Mets were last place and not in any position to be in playoffs and the show still lost about 200k viewers in overnights. I do think that a loss of 140k - 250k (somewhere in that range) is possible and would make the finals for Crossfire less than Roulette, but one would have to wait and see and I admit I'm not a clairvoyant, just trying to do some math.
***

dollarman - you're very funny. I like that. Anyway, I agree that the interesting thing is that only the SHARES were better than a House rerun. The House rerun actually earned 3.4 million viewers and came in 4th it total number above first-run Smallville. Also, as you point out, Echo actually had a smidge higher value going into finals tallying sans a pre-empt to worry about.

SV's ratings are up, and "Crossfire" with its Clois kiss seems to be pointing in the right direction. And now it is being projected that a tenth season is likely-- I couldn't be happier!
http://tvbythenumbers.com/category/renewcancel-cw-shows

The article is from Oct 27th, actaeon.

"Crossfire"'s final numbers are up at pifeedback taking into account the Chicago preemption.

Smallville (92% coverage, CW usually 95%)
- 2.424 million viewers
- 1.5/3 HH
- 1.1/4 A18-49
- 1.2/5 A18-34
- 1.0/4 W18-34

The total viewers went down from the previous episode. The women's demo is up slightly.

2.42 ?



Not that far from the mark.

Right. It didn't gain anything this week. It lost. Funny, because I don't think the show is hovering at 2.5 because of more Nois. I think it's because the producers/writers are throwing everything mythos-related, including the kitchen sink, into these latest episodes. It's Toyman, Roulette, Zod, Jor-El, Kandor, the Justice Society, etc. They've utterly abandoned the concept of Smallville and are just going for straight out Superman stuff. If they had not gone with all these DC related characters and storylines and only tried to carry this season with forced Cnois, I'm confident they'd be under 2 million at this point. Of course we'll never know for sure, but that's how I'm reading the fact the show started with a downtick and stopped the bleeding as soon as more DC characters hit the scene a few weeks ago.

Even with the loss of viewers, right now- if I had to put money on it- I'd say season 10 is likely. The hard part (getting TW) is over, the money gained by losing AM, the built-in fanbase, older shows like SPN and OTH that they might want to put to pasture, and the embarassing desperation from the voices of TPTB (and when you bring in the Wonder Twins, you lose all rights to the phrase "we have so many more stories to tell!") that puts CW in a better bargaining position. Even if a lot of AM fans dropped out in S10 with her gone, I feel that it would be too little too late. TPTB would get the go ahead anyway and this is too high profile a show on a not too high profile a network for them to cut the season short in the middle of a season.

From SparkleforSmallville at Ksite:



Smallville S9 *Final Rating - DVR
#1 Savior ~ *2.57mil. & Live+7= 3.39mil.

#2 Metallo ~ *2.24mil. & Live+7= 3.03mil.

#3 Rabid ~ *2.28mil. & Live+7= 3.02mil.

#4 Echo ~ *2.59mil. & Live+7= 3.25mil.

#5 Roulette ~ *2.47mil.

#6 Crossfire ~ *2.42mil

Smallville's looking great!

n/m.

The Live+7 ratings are proof that the show has lost viewers since the end of last season. And that has nothing to do with the Friday move. Despite that, as someone mentioned above, at this rate a 10th season is very likely. However, given how much the ratings drop at the second half of each season, you have to wonder if SV will be getting above 2mil next April/May.

Dude, kudos on looking for the bright side but how can 2.42 million viewers be considered "great"? Not even in the context of SV's usual ratings is that a great total. And if this is the season high, that's really not a good thing.

Now, if it's true that the Geoff Johns eps will air on Thursdays, those eps might push up towards the ratings of previous seasons. But the CW needs to get off their ass & give the show some decent promotion. Where are the cast interviews? Even if Tom's too busy to talk, why not get Callum B. to chat up Crossfire & Kandor? My Canadian station made their own season 9 promo and it features almost all footage from pre-S8 (lots of Clana.) You'd never know that new eps were currently airing.

I don't see the CW shoving aside TVD just for two Very Special Episodes of Smallville. They seem perfectly happy with the way SV is performing on Fridays. Moving back to Thursdays for those two episodes would be admitting they're doing something "wrong" and I really can't see that happening.


There's supposed to be a TVGuide article on him coming out soon, I think?


Ouch. Mine may not promote specific episodes, but at least it mostly uses footage from Doomsday and Savior.

I saw a spoiler circulating on twitter that those two eps will air on Thursdays....no idea if it's valid info. Would it make sense to slot SV into the Thurs 8pm slot when Vampire Diaries is on hiatus? Maybe it is just fan-hopefulness. I think it would be smart as often there is ratings-sag in January.


On the Sun TV website, they still promote SV with a photo of Clark, Lex and Lana!

I doubt. The repeats are to solidify the show on the mind of their viewers if the new show is gaining on their demo a lot more than SV is and they desperately need to keep people interested to keep their Thursday nights strong then it would bad business, IMO to disappoint the audience and/or trick them into watching SV. That would only cause a lot of problems for the ratings for both shows, YMMV.

The episodes that you're talking about air (I believe) the 2nd and 3rd week of January, all shows should be back from winter break at that point and I seriously doubt The CW will shelve TVD for SV.

TVD is doing very well in that Thursday at 8 slot, it just broke a 2.0 in every single demo this week, it even hit over a 3.0 in W18-34. That is Dawn's target market and even in the Thursday night slot SV wasn't pulling in those numbers (not the 18-34W)

I think that's pretty much a fans wishful thinking. To be honest I don't think it would be of any benefit to SV to move it to Thursday night for 2 episodes only.

So a CNois episodes ratings fell, again. Why am I not surprised? CNois once again is not a ratings winner.

I find it hard to believe DO or the CW would replace TVD with SV considering the ratings of both programs. Simple question to me is, WHY?

I personally think it would be a terrible idea to air the two episodes on Thursdays and then move back to Friday because it would just confuse both the TVD viewers and those still watching SV. Some might even miss the announcement tha it has moved to Thursday and miss it altogether which would hurt SV rather than improve its ratings. YMMV

CW Press Release DVR #s for Week of Oct. 18

So DVR numbers for the week of 10/18 amounted to just over one million viewers. Isn't that down from before?

I love how the CW chooses to use the Live numbers (not the Live +SD) as the basis of their press releases, in order to boost their DVR numbers.

Cos of course, if they'd used the Live+SD numbers, the LIve + 7 DVR gains would have been only 0.7M for Smallville. Which is not as impressive as "more than a million".

I believe they always compare Live and Live+7D. Most networks do, and I believe that's how Nielsen presents the data as well? That's pretty standard practice, and they're doing it for all shows, so it's not like Smallville is getting some Super Special Data-Skewing.

Okay, so back when I gave a shit, I paid attention to these numbers. First, the thing to notice is that the difference is between the "Live" and "Live + 7" is not always clearly linked to what we call "overnights" and "finals" when we chat in this thread. For example:

The CW press release from the overnights:



The "finals" as reported by Travis at pifeedback:



The recent CW press release regarding the DVR impact (note how the first number is smaller than the "finals"):



The TV-By-The-Numbers table (the BEST source in my opinion):



I hope the formatting works. The first quote is a shortened version of the columns, the second is the numbers for W/E 10/18.

Live+ SD appears closest to what we call overnights. We never see the "live" numbers as far as I can tell.

As it happens, I tracked this carefully in S7 (using the same TV by the numbers table) and the average DVR increase was 874K with only Traveler and Arctic just slightly over 1M. I only got 1 data point from S8 (Odyssey) and it was 888K. I stopped giving a shit about Smallville after what I considered the end of the Smallville I knew (Odyssey) so I don't have any more data than this. BUT, for arguments sake, let's assume that around 880K is what the DVR average would have been presuming that there was not a sudden DVR drop off (which I bet we would have heard about).

IF that assumption is correct, here's what this means to me:
- Smallville has dropped about 2 million live viewers and added approximately 200K in DVR watchers due to the date shift.

Not exactly compelling positive data from my perspective. To me, it says the stalwart viewers who loved the show but can't watch on Friday night is up by about 200K. They lost, permanently IMO, the interest of 1.8M people.

JMO, of course, but 1.8M viewers are not bothering with either DVR'ing or watching live. They are GONE in my opinion. The show is not compelling enough for them to waste their time.

Of course, IMO at the end of the day, it apparently will not matter. Dawn wanted 2M, she got 2.5ish. Case closed. The Clois-is-bestest-evah koolaid drinking by TPTB will continue merrily until Dawn changes her mind.

Again, this is all my opinion but since numbers were involved, I had to play.

That is how the CW does it so it's the same for all their shows but I don't know if that's standard. It seems that every week I see the guy from TV By The Numbers having to explain the data to people and then he complains about how The CW does their numbers.

One of his comments from today (I think); pertaining to TVD ratings.

If what you say is true, that really makes me laugh, because the TVbytheNumbers guy is one to talk. TVbytheNumbers used to only display LIVE and LIVE+7D data when they shared DVR ratings, up through the Nov. 24th, 2008 DVR post. He only started including LIVE+SD as of his December 3rd, 2008 DVR post, as he explains within that post.

LOL, that is pretty funny.

Yeah, that's what threw me off. And that's why I thought only the CW did that on their press releases/for their shows. My mistake, then.

Five CW Shows (including Smallville) score season highs...

I really have to laugh as well at all these little articles and press releases coming out. It basically just demonstrates the old adage: You can make statistics say anything you want them to say. We keep getting all this spin about how the numbers are so good for SV, and how this week they "scored season highs", but the truth is the show has lost close to 2 million viewers since last year (as SueB demonstrated). But the spin will continue regardless and you really can take just about any stat and twist it to make things look however you want them to. Right now that's what we are seeing with SV.

That's misleading. "Crossfire" did not score a seasonal high rating--it scored a smidge higher in one demo, which is STILL pathetically low. It reminds me of when I took AP Physics in high school and my "seasonal high" was 61% for the fall semester. Sure, maybe it was better than the 55 and the 59, but it was nothing to post on the fridge. And bless the curve.

There's no question that the ratings are abysmal. But do these numbers suck just enough to qualify for another sucky season, or do they suck too much to justify S10? It's going to be a fine line in the end.

Once again Smallville excels at "third place in the shoe tying contest". This is taking praising mediocrity to a new art form.

Savior-2.57 million............EHC/Game-2.03 million.....plus 540k
Metallo-2.24 million...........EHC/Game-1.75 million.....plus 490k
Rabid- 2.28 million............EHC/Game-1.80 million.....plus 480k
Echo- 2.59 million.............EHC/Game-1.78 million.....plus 810k
Roulette- 2.47 million........EHC/Game-1.26 million.....plus 1210k
Crossfire- 2.42 milllion.......EHC/Game-1.71 million.....plus 710k


Good job Smallville.

Found by Elly F on livejournal

http://screenrant.com/ratings-smallville-f...ward-aco-32906/

I don't quite get it. 2.4 is about what SV is averaging these days between Roulette and Crossfire. It had the best share of the season this week, that's true, but it's fifth in ratings, trailing house reruns by 800k. It's last in 18-34w demo and they bragged with "faint praise" as an afterthought in a press release about how it finally hit 1.0 when shows like SPN are getting 1.4 or VD is hitting 2.0 in SV's old time slot. It's the most expensive show on the network. Even if Mack leaves for magical season ten, SAG requires cast raises for the rest. It's not up for syndication---is way past that---so there's no revenue there. It's the second lowest earner on the network, at $162 dollars (0.05% more) than SPN (pre November sweeps) for 30 second slot. They earn 3,000 LESS or about 9% less per spot than the average of Chris and The Game last season. In addition, they keep being compared to Smackdown's massive MALE ratings, but Smackdown, averaging 4-5 million was still canceled for not fitting Dawn's image of wimmins.

I am not sure how low expectations have to be in order for 2.4 million and demos at traditionally less than 1.0 for women and DVR's down by 30% from last year, looks like a good investment.

I'm just a bit confused about all the sudden praise, when it's still dead last on Fridays, but YMMV.
***

I also notice, on another note, that the CW releases press releases for VD and SPN weekly about their strong numbers, especially VD, comparing it to how low in women SV was just last season, but so far for SV, we've had about two and an email to TV by the Numbers. One was about it skewing male for Echo and one was about how it's this week gone up to new "highs" (still obfuscating, it's total viewership was down by 200k from season high) as the final mention with four other shows. As mentioned, if everyone in the network increases, SV remains in the bottom of the pack. In fact, it decreased 0.1% in viewers this week for sweeps, when VD and SPN---the praised thursday paranormal powerhouse (against fox's megaratings for world series)---went up 10%.

Because it's still pulling in good numbers for the CW on a dead night. The CW doesn't care how it's doing compared to how it did last season - or on Thursdays period - it cares how SV is doing in its current timeslot. DO has maintained numbers on Thursdays with TVD and has improved numbers on Fridays by moving SV over even with a sharp decline in overall viewers for the show specifically. That's still good business. Is it good for the show? Probably not, but I don't think the CW gives a damn in that regard. They'll take the better Friday numbers and let the show go out in S10, anticipating syndication, while more firmly establishing TVD in a prime slot and looking for a replacement for SPN. Hell, if SPN is still around in two years, I expect it'll take the Friday slot once SV is over.

But SV hit syndication five years ago and isn't a money maker in that way, nor has potential to be a money maker that way.

ANTM was drawing .5-0.6 in the female demo as a free rerun on fridays and SV is usually in the 0.7-0.8 range. Isn't it better to try launching a new franchise that costs less and will do better in women, then clinging to a dying one that is not bringing in the right kind of audience? Also, isn't it easier for Dawn to just make Fridays rerun nights if she wants. I've not checked to see what VD reruns do but I have to assume with a 18-34w demo of almost 2.0, even in reruns, their women demo is better than SV's first one.

I know everyone is excited about it doing better than EHC/The Game as well as almost comparable to smackdown, but those three shows got axed for either low ratings or bringing in the wrong demo. SV is declined in viewership compared to itself and, while doing better than EHC and the Game, it's earning less on average for 30 second slot than they did averaged out last season but carries a long term cast with high salaries to pay (even axing mack in 10 = about 2.2 million less they'd pay all year or about a free episode out of 22) as well as a massive FX budget that most CW shows don't have to carry. A rerun, movie, reality show or new franchise have potential to do much better with women. IMHO, it seems odd to think that it's a slam dunk for a season ten here or the performance is more than mediocre, but ymmv.

That depends on whether you think the CW actually cares that much about the target demo in regards to SV, which I don't. If that was all that was keeping the show around it would be gone by now because it's never brought in the demo. What the CW is looking at instead, I have no idea, but I really have a hard time believing that w18-34 is the measuring stick when it comes to SV specifically from the network's perspective.

Granted, but let's say then for the argument, that CW doesn't care about women 18-34 wrt SV. That's possible, I grant. They're at 2.42 + 2.46 = 2.44 million viewers. They're about the middle of the pack for the CW network in viewership now. They've skewed toward 18-49/older in Rabid, Roulette, and Echo. They're also carrying the largest cost. As a nine year old show, they've lost 45% of the audience (the CPAs are going to have coronaries trying to spin the drop from Bloodline to Kandor in the same week but a year apart, imho). This is about the best they're going to do, barring a massive jump for a week or two for Society-Legends, which is by no means guaranteed. Failsday (before we knew it sucked) was pimped with JLA members, Legion members and Clark v Doomsday fight and still got 3.1 million and was one of the lowest rated episodes of the series until this season. Even if Society-Legends did do a jump, when the fanboys leave because bored by persuasion, it'll drop back down to vacillating at best from 2.2-2.4. That might be great compared to much cheaper EHC or The Game. It might even be a higher overall number in millions than Gossip Girl or 90210, but it's still not making ad revenue, it's still never gonna rebound to higher figures, and, as an old show with a very heavy and complex mythos, it's not going to pick up a vast new audience. It's most likely going to bleed from here, imho. So if I were Dawn, I'd wonder if its worth spending the money on a show that carries a high cost and is unlikely to gain new viewership because it's too old and too complicated a backstory when I have a slew of new pilots more geared to my core audience, ready to go.

What Tom makes, seriously, as EP/Director/Lead has got to be a huge crimp in the CW budget when compared to a show like 90210 with a lesser known cast or VD or SPN where the boys are locked into old salaries for two more years (including this season). It's just a lot of carrying costs with not much return. Similarly, WB can carry some costs but they'd have to ask themselves if they'd rather invest in SPN with rising DVD sales or SV with falling ones. Personally, I know which horse I'd bet on.

Finally, the buzz just isn't there. Shows lik Gossip Girl get a mad level of exposure because of Chase Crawford being in movie remakes or Leighton Meester's pop career. Similarly, shows like VD are hyped in all the magazines and industry sources and SPN is critically acclaimed. It's also about being visible and getting word of mouth and SV is usually just scorned if mentioned at all and the cast is basically below the radar now, at best.

How do you know Smallville has no potential in the syndication market? I'm pretty sure ABC Family aired episodes for a few years. There are also showing episodes on an HD channel (can't remember it right now) and it is being sold overseas.

Here are the lastest VD rerun numbers:

The Vampire Diaries ®
- 1.304 million viewers
- 0.9/1 HH
- 0.6/2 A18-49
- 0.8/2 A18-34
- 0.9/2 W18-34


Every show is getting less in advertising rates this year, not just Smallville. Unlike EHC/Game, Smallville sells DVD's, does great on iTunes and Amazon.com and has a huge overseas market. Add in the fact that Smallville is a Warner Bros. property so the network sees a lot more profit.

I think she's already made that decision. She didn't have to greenlight S9 or have WB Television bother negotiating with TW, knowing she was going to move the show to Fridays. What she wants, I think, is a solid ratings getter on Friday nights and again, given that they are comparing the numbers to the network's past performance on Fridays and not SV's past performance, it seems to me she's perfectly happy to let it ride, and probably will be for S10, too. They might have a slew of new demo-geared shows ready to go, but TBL tanked and MP is on the bubble. New shows aren't a ratings guarantee; SV pretty much is at this point.

- 0.8/2 A18-34
- 0.9/2 W18-34

VD's at least skewing young and it's doing better in females than the reruns of ANTM and doing fair compared to SV for free for the network. The DVD sales are decent but down about 15% from last year alone. The WB does see revenue from it, but it's not seeing growth in DVD sales. I also meant that the money is made WHEN the show hits syndication and is sold off. It's not even actively running on ABC family anymore and hasn't in several years, as far as I know. I know it syndicates world wide, which is something at least, but as far as DVD sales and syndication, it's not the golden goose it once was.
***

knowing she was going to move the show to Fridays

Except she didn't. They didn't announce a renewal officially until post the Lana arc where female demos went through the roof for KK's return and general viewership was up for the traditional winter slump. She didn't decide to move it to fridays/announce it unitl Up Fronts. I have a strong suspicion the lack of return for expense and mass promotion of the Doomsday episode of SV versus the audience and critic response to SPN's finale episode, was the deciding factor which show got kicked to make room for VD on Thursdays.
***

given that they are comparing the numbers to the network's past performance on Fridays

True, it is outdoing Chris and The Game, but it is underperforming compared to Wrestling by about 2 million viewers and yet wrestling is still gone with the wind.
***

it seems to me she's perfectly happy to let it ride

I believe she took a chance on SV knowing that it was the highest rated scripted show on the network last year with what seemed like a dedicated fanbase. 45% of those fans have left and the show is middle of the pack now wrt ratings at best. It's also unclear what she's looking for in sweeps. If she was hoping for a huge numbers boost like Kara brought or like KK brought in winter, she's not seen that. Kara brought it up to 5 million, it was a massive like 600-800k increase in one week. So far, SV has actually gone down in total viewers for sweeps and placed fifth on its night wrt to millions of viewers.
***
New shows aren't a ratings guarantee; SV pretty much is at this point.

No, they are most definitely gambles. However, they have a chance to grow and bringing in Heather Locklear is a sign that they're willing to take chances for growth (TBL was a clusterfuck to start, IMHO, because of the lead/Barton's drug addiction causing production delays). SV has, imho, only the potential to bleed further and lose more. It's a nine year old show, it's just not possible this late to gain a new audience.