CBC Gem and other Canadian broadcasters are seeing dismal viewership, which some studio CEOs believe is a consequence of over-relying on government handouts and not producing enough original storytelling.
C21, a global entertainment community for international publishers and digital businesses held a panel discussion entitled View From the Top in Toronto last week, where several industry CEOs gathered to talk about the problem of getting Canadian eyeballs on their content.
The focus was on how to let new and innovative Canadian stories take centre stage as opposed to emphasizing ticking the right boxes to secure government financing.
“We don’t really lead with our storytelling here. We talk about it a lot – we say the story is everything – but a lot of the things that make the Canadian industry what it is today are commodities,” said Blink49 Studios CEO John Morayniss.
According to Morayniss, the Canadian content system is driven by financial incentives and various funds to get shows greenlit, instead of prioritizing new voices to develop projects.
“The tax credit is a commodity, the low Canadian dollar is a commodity, even the production infrastructure we have in Canada is a commodity – it’s not a unique, defining principle or value. But what is unique about Canada is the culture,” he said.
CBC’s executive VP Barbara Williams noted that of what little viewership Canadian broadcasters do get, it’s primarily from international streaming platforms, with less than 4% taking place on local services.
“If you are wanting someone to stream your show, you’ve got to get past the fact that 96% of it is happening on a foreign platform, not on a Canadian platform,” said Wiliams. “We don’t exist to the audience we’re all excited about hoping will discover our show.”
According to data from CBC/Radio-Canada, 98% of Ontario viewers watched foreign-owned platforms between September 2023 to June 2024, with YouTube being the dominant source accounting for 32.9% of viewership.
TikTok and Netflix were a close second and third for top platforms, at 16.6% and 14.1%, respectively.
The other top platforms were Prime Video (13.6%), Instagram Reels (10.2%), Disney+ (3.7%), Twitch (2.5%), Facebook video (1.5%), Apple TV+ (0.8%) and Bell Media-owned Crave (0.6%), CBS News (0.5%), Fubo TV (0.4%), Tubi (0.4%), Paramount+ (0.4%), Pluto TV (0.2%), DAZN (0.2%) and Discovery+ (0.1%).
However, CBC’s streaming services came in last, accounting for only 0.35% of the total.
While Williams acknowledged to the panel that CBC has “kind of lost the thread of where the audiences went,” she doesn’t beleve that it’s “a reflection of what we make.”
“We make a lot of outstanding stuff,” she said. “But of those many [challenges], one of them is the tsunami of foreign services that have just taken over our audience. We make all this stuff that we’re all excited about, and no wonder we can’t get it discovered.”
True North contacted CBC to get their insight as to why this might be the case.
“In the face of the significant dominance of global streamers, CBC is not alone in trying to get traction with our streaming service (Gem). That said, we keep trying different strategies with our content, marketing and distribution platforms to attract more viewing,” CBC’s Head of Public Affairs told True North.
However, Morayniss argues that funds granted for Canadian content must prioritize new voices and projects and not be blown on production financing.
“The real problem in Canada is there’s not enough R&D (research and development). We rush to production, and probably spend too much on production,” he said, adding that Canada’s best talents will continue to head south of the border unless the system fosters an environment more conducive to risk taking.
“I hate to say this, [because] we have some of the most talented people in Canada, but when you run [projects] through the system, there’s something that tweaks, and there’s a certain level of mediocrity,” said Morayniss.
“It’s not [every show], but the system itself forces us to make some compromises, and if I’m a storyteller and I want to stay in Canada – I don’t want those compromises. My observation is that we have to figure out a way to eliminate or minimize the creative compromises we have here in Canada.”