Cable Pockets Healthy Share of Political Ad Dollars

Cable appears to have attracted 18 to 20% of the overall advertising spend by the candidates for president, according to Tim Kay, director of political strategy for National Cable Communications, which sells spot cable space for owners Comcast Corp., Cox Communications and Time Warner Cable. He estimated that cable also got 15 to 18% of the advertising for Congressional and local races. Evan Tracey, founder and COO of Campaign Media Analysis Group, put those predictions into dollar values. In September, he predicted that the political ad spend will top out at about $3 billion, with $500 million of that spend on media other than broadcast television. By the end of last week, broadcasters in the swing states, including Ohio, Florida, Colorado and New Mexico "were saturated," Tracey said, and campaigns had begun buying as much ad availabilities in Kentucky, North Carolina and Georgia as they could.