OTT Growth Seems To Temper Demand for a la Carte MVPD, Digitalsmiths Says

The cord-cutting trend dipped in Q4, with 17.5 percent of people without a pay-TV service reporting they cut cable in the past 12 months, compared with more than 19 percent answering that way in Q3, a Digitalsmiths report released Thursday said. When asked if they planned to make a change in their multichannel video programming distributor in the next 12 months, 5.6 percent of respondents said they plan to cut altogether, 6.6 percent said they plan to change providers, 2.4 percent said they plan to go with an online app or rental service, Digitalsmiths said. All those numbers were up from the Q4 2013 and Q4 2012 responses, Digitalsmiths said. Nearly 74 percent of respondents said they were interested in a la carte video packages, which is down for the fourth quarter in a row, Digitalsmiths said. The most-desired channels for stand-alone service are Discovery Channel, ABC, CBS, History and NBC, and the average price respondents want to pay for a la carte service is $40.56 per month, or $3.63 per channel per month, it said. Digitalsmiths said the growth of over-the-top offerings and skinny bundle packages is likely leading to the declining interest in a la carte MVPD offerings, though those interested still are a sizable population. Today, it said, "almost all major Pay-TV providers have a package with 50-70 channels for roughly $49 or less." The survey, done by a third party, was of 3,120 adult consumers across the U.S. and Canada.