I think only on rogers.

Centerline wrote:

So with many providers rebranding or dropping the various food or home channels, Are the dropped channels available anywhere either online, or streaming?
My carrier in southwest Ontario,, Execulink Fibre says the channels are no longer available to them.

Rogers Cable, Shaw Cable (owned by Rogers) and Shaw Direct Satellite are the only big providers offering the new HGTV, Food Network etc.  There are a couple smaller providers who are either negotiating carriage or may have launched since Jan1. 
Citytv+ and Discovery+ would be options if you want to stream the services.  I think Rogers has made a mess of the launch,
 

Corus has done a better job promoting their new Flavour and Home Networks.  To me there isn't that much difference between these and the HGTV and Food Networks.  I don't think Bell Fibe is even carrying the Rogers stations so far.  I have only seen a few spots for Food Network on Rogers channels, they should have been doing this months ago.

Say what you want about Corus, other than Sportsnet, they seem much better at promoting their specialty channels than Rogers.    

Does anyone think Bell is in a hurry to launch Rogers replacement channels.  They probably want people to get used to USA Network, Oxygen and all the other new CTV branded channels.  And Rogers is not playing nice by offering CTV's or Corus's channels on Free Preview as announced.  In fact Shaw no longer has Video on Demand offerings for Corus or Bell channels.  Those agreements either ended or were pulled as of Dec 31, 2024.  Rogers as disrupted the hegemony of the Canadian BDU market.

They have adds now on the citytv youtube channel.

tvguy wrote:

mace wrote:

The only shows I have ever watched on Food Network are You Gotta Eat Here and  Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. Nothing on HGTV has ever interested me. Both channels could disappear and I wouldn't miss them.

Both shows are available on Flavour network.  Actually the shows on Flavour are more varied than on the old Food Network - for my taste.   Lots of new content, including the omnipresent Gordon Ramsay "kitchen nightmares".

I would foresee a lot of advertisers sticking with Corus.  Rogers is going to have an uphill battle to attract advertising because they just lost hundreds of thousands of eyeballs without Bell, Bell Satellite and many other BDUs.   

Does anyone think that Flavour Network will compete against Food Network? Same with HGTV and Home Network?

RadioActive wrote:

I saw an ad on Rogers-owned City TV reminding viewers that there's only one Food Network, that it's the original and they shouldn't be fooled by any 'imitators.' It then lists many of the shows viewers are presumably familiar with. 

First time since this all started that I've seen that. 

 
I believe Rogers is crapping their pants over their totally botched attempted relaunch of Food and HGTV networks that they poached from Corus. And as far as “imitators” are concerned, that would be Rogers trying to pretend they know what they’re doing broadcast-wise, they don’t, I once worked for them so trust me.They could learn a great deal from the pros at Corus, but they won’t.

LOSat wrote:

Does Rogers have any Canadian content on any of their newly launched Discovery branded channels.  I haven't seen any.  I bet they expected Corus to rollover and they would low-all all the existing Canadian productions to fill their Canadian content requirements on their new channels.

 
Rogers could have Canadian content if they had started producing stuff 6 months ago when they poached the channels from Corus, but being the amateurs they are, this didn’t happen. I also think you’re right that Rogers probably thought they could pick up programming from Corus for a low-ball rate, not expecting Corus to come up with their own networks to continue airing their productions on. This one is not looking good on Rogers at all, and I love it, can’t you tell?

RadioAaron wrote:

I get the sense that Rogers is soft-launching these until they get wider carriage. 

 
Carriage should have been in place by January 1st RadioAaron, the date Rogers originally promoted they were launching the networks. They haven’t sorted out carriage with Bell or practically any other carriers across the country, seriously, and they also poached Discovery from Bell, so Bell’s in no hurry to help Rogers. I have followed this one very closely. It may be a soft-launch now, but that was not the original plan. And they had six months, Corus created two new networks from scratch in that time, and they both are looking pretty good. You can’t buy smart.

Scarboroughbluffsradiof99 wrote:

Rogers is getting dumber and dumber by the minut.

 
And it is costing them. Their stocks were down 29% last year.

Rogers has another big problem.  Corus acquired long term rights to many of the Canadian programs it telecast on its Canadianized channels such as Food and HGTV.  So shows like Property Bros, continue on Home, Global, etc.  They were meeting significant CRTC requirements on Food Network and HGTV.  Rogers probably doesn't have much of a Canadian catalogue of shows that fit those channels., and they're too cheap to produce stuff.  Witness the cancellation of Cityline, etc.
Then there's the growing number of FAST TV channels on platforms such as Roku, Samsung, etc.  We get plenty of good cuisine channels, do it yourself, etc. on the FAST TV channels, for free.  My daughter doesn't subscribe to Bell, or Rogers - she's very happy with the quality of the Roku FAST channels - for free.

What's going to motivate us to subscribe to Rogers' channels if they get carried on Bell?  We cut back our Bell TV monthly TV expenditure package by 70% - because we've switched viewing to Bon Appetit channel on Samsung, the Property bros Channel, and Architectural Digest channel and lots of other DIY channels for free.  

 And if you like cooking shows, there's no shortage of them on WNED-TV HD-2 - which we receive on an antenna.  To get any kind of significant penetration on most cable platforms Rogers is going to have to give these channels away for free, or a very low per subscriber fee.  If you don't subscribe to a top-tier (expensive) Cable or satellite package, you're not likely to buy Rogers' channels at $4 per month a-la-carte - and that's per channel.  That's the minimum price Bell charges.  It's insane.  

Rogers' new negotiating strategy with (Canadian) programming services is to offer them a few cents per month, calculated on their "basic sub" numbers - in other words, rogers has 2 million "basic subs" - times a few cents per month. That number varies per month and is usually headed downwards as the cable universe shrinks.  It is a pittance versus what Canadian services used to receive on a per-subscriber basis in the large cable packages.  The couple of cents per month, calculated on the "basic sub" universe could provide Rogers with  some level of wider carriage. But subscriber revenues are pretty small, versus what Corus earned in the past from the cable and satellite cos for the same "US Branded" channels.  These are the facts of life in 2025.   I have first-hand knowledge of  cableco deals - as recently as 3 weeks ago..

In order to attract significant national advertsing revenue a cable tv channel in Canada needs to be in at least 700,000 households.  It may be even higher now. My friends who operate TV networks tell me that's a requirement.  Why?  Because that is the minimum base at which there would be enough "viewing" subscribers to "trigger" some Numeris meters.   We're not even talking stellar ratings numbers.... That's a tough number of households to achieve unless a service is in high penetration cable and satellite packages. Sure, Rogers has a good subscriber base with their systems and the former Shaw systems, but they need hundreds of thousands of additional households, in order to acquire enough numeris household to support and sustain reasonable advertising rates.

Strike three against Rogers, is that Corus, cleverly has sold packages to a number of top tier advertser "partners" for Home and Flavour.  So why would those national advertisers spend "real" money with Rogers without ratings and sufficient national distribution.  Rogers will probably provide a lot of reduced price or free inventory to advertisers, but that doesn't enhance their bottom line.  You'll see endless ads for Rogers' products, Mocha and what's his name, and other Rogers stations.  All of those (free) advertising avails are not going to generate what Rogers needs to pay Warner-Discovery (program output and trandemark/brandling licence fees) and Canadian TV  producers.   Perhaps I'm wrong, but after more than a half century in this industry, and still working every day...that's my take.

 There's also a complaint before the CRTC by Corus versus Rogers regarding (recent) Rogers' tactics.  Here's the link.

Corus Entertainment Inc.

Corus Entertainment Inc. v Rogers Communications Canada Inc. complaint concerning a breach of Sections 9 of the Broadcasting Distribution Regulations and conditions of service related to the Wholesale Code

Accros Canada 

Food Network Canada; HGTV Canada

2024-0573-7
 

Last edited by tvguy (January 7, 2025 6:44 pm)