Friday, May 30, 2008 – The 43rd Annual Academy of Country Music Awards drew 11.7 million viewers and was the second-highest rated program throughout the full 3 hours it aired on Sunday, May 18th on CBS, a 26-percent jump from 2007.
The show reversed the trend of declining awards show ratings and posted across-the-board increases during a week in which total viewership of the 5 major networks was 13 percent less than the same time a year ago, according to Nielsen Media Research.
The ACMS had a positive impact on record sales for artists who performed at the event. According to Nielsen Soundscan, Carrie Underwood's sales increased 58 percent, Rodney Atkins' sales increased 73 percent, Miranda Lambert's sales increased 52 percent, Garth Brooks' sales increased 33 percent and Brooks & Dunn's sales increased 19 percent. Sugarland had a 72 percent increase and notched the highest country chart debut of their career at number 27 with their current single "All I Want To Do," which they performed live during the show.
The strong performance of the show and increased consumer appetite for country is good news for Dick Clark Productions, which produces the show, and the Academy of Country Music, which recently announced an exclusive partnership agreement to develop new concert specials, multiple country music-themed reality and competition series, as well as artist profiles and other programming initiatives that will air on both music-oriented networks and other broadcast and cable networks. The partnership is also developing both repurposed and original country music-themed programming for new media platforms.
"This is a terrific accomplishment, particularly when you consider the current television environment," said Bob Romeo, Executive Director of the Academy of Country Music. "If viewer erosion from the writer's strike was taken out of the scenario, I think our ratings increase would have been even more significant. At the end of the day, the success of our show this year really demonstrates the appeal of country music and viewer's investment in the format."
Romeo credits the ratings success to the first-ever fan-voted Entertainer of the Year category as one reason consumers were potentially more engaged this year. Kenny Chesney won it, but criticized the method.
Orly Adelson, President of Dick Clark Productions, said, "CBS's strong support of the program and the contributions made by our partners, such as Great American Country (GAC), Westwood One, The Home Depot and Six Flags, all provided added exposure to millions of consumers through advertising, signage and promotions. We have a lot of people to thank for this success."
""The ratings performance is a shot in the arm for our partnership with the Academy of Country Music," said Adelson. " We are very excited about what lies ahead and are accelerating development of country themed original programming."
