Ratings Review: CBS Fridays - First 4 Weeks

CBS knows what viewers are at home on Friday nights and delivers the programming they enjoy. It may be a lot of older viewers, but the series are getting just as many 18-49 viewers as the other networks on the night, sometimes more.

UNDERCOVER BOSS has worked nicely as the lead off series on Friday nights. It proved its value last season after the fiasco that was THE JOB at mid season. The numbers for UB have been relatively solid, but the episode on October 18th, seems to have reinvigorated it. By the promos, they had a boss that quit the episode before its completion. That helped bring in an additional 1.2 million viewers and an increase of 38% in the A18-49 ratings. We shall see if that bump can be sustained through the November Sweeps.

HAWAII FIVE-O looks to be the final missing piece of CBS' Friday nights. Both the series and the night have benefited from the move from Monday nights. Viewership for H5O has increased by roughly 1.0 to 1.5 million viewers, from last year's first four weeks. It fits well with BLUE BLOODS and is a great transition program at 9 p.m. CBS can fell good about giving the series a 5th season next year, without the stigma of pandering to only the syndication value of the series.

BLUE BLOODS is a regular visitor of the Nielsen top 20 chart each week. It is the only series, for a couple of seasons, that almost always draws 10 to 11 million viewers on Friday nights. Yes, the audiences skews to an older crowd, but as cable revenues becomes more and more influential into the companies revenue stream, eyeballs will be more important than the age of the eyeballs. A cable subscriber generates the same revenue, no mater the age.

Live+SD Ratings

Series	Category	09/27	10/04	10/11	10/18	AVG
Undercover Boss	Viewers*	8.22	7.62	7.86	9.18	8.22
	A18-49	1.6	1.4	1.3	1.8	1.5
Hawaii Five-O	Viewers*	9.46	9.75	9.24	8.81	9.32
	A18-49	1.6	1.5	1.5	1.4	1.5
Blue Bloods	Viewers*	11.70	11.37	10.56	10.56	11.04
	A18-49	1.7	1.4	1.4	1.3	1.5

* - in millions