Upfront spending frenzy

June 09, 2008 The barrels of ad dollars being dumped into the current upfront marketplace are proving that broadcast TV, for the foreseeable future and against all odds, really remains the king of all media. Despite the writers strike that drove viewers away from their TV sets and a recessionary economy that has consumers spending less, the Big Four broadcast networks are expected to cumulatively take in more upfront dollars -- a total north of $9 billion -- than they did last year. Some of the market momentum was the result of advertisers shifting dollars into the upfront to avoid another year of hefty scatter price increases.

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