The so-called golden age of television could be on track to lose some of its luster in the coming months. You don’t have to take our word for it—listen to John Landgraf, the chairman of FX Content and FX Productions, who coined the term “peak TV” in 2015.

“In August, I said I believed that 2022 would finally mark the peak of scripted US series, and that is still my bet—while noting with humility that I have been wrong on this prediction twice before,” Landgraf said last week at the Television Critics Association’s biannual press tour. “I think we have a strong indication that we’re going to start to see a decline beginning in 2023.”

Looking ahead: Signs of a scripted-series decline, which have also been reported by research firms like Ampere Analysis, come as linear-TV viewership continues to wane and as streaming services like Netflix have shifted their focus to profits. Industrywide belt-tightening may eventually translate to fewer culture-defining scripted TV moments that were once abundant, and with that, fewer opportunities for advertisers.

“I still think we’re going to get those amazing big titles like the Lord of the Rings and the Game of Thrones titles that came out last year,” Hannah Walsh, a research manager at Ampere Analysis, said. “But I think they’ll just happen more infrequently than they used to.”

Hit the brakes? For years, Landgraf has taken time during appearances at press tours to present FX Research on the state of English-language scripted programming on television. By many measures, 2022 was a great year for the genre:

• From January 2022 through June 2022, 351 total scripted English-language shows were released in the US, on pace for a 14% increase compared to the same timeframe in 2021, according to FX Research cited by Landgraf.
• But output began to slow from July through December, to 2% less than in that same time period a year prior, Landgraf said.

Continue reading here.—KS

Mike Feldman knows a lot about how people shop, whether they’re ordering stuff online or picking up a desperately needed rotisserie chicken at the grocery store.

As head of Dentsu’s SVP, head of commerce and retail media, he oversees a part of the industry that’s exploded in the last few years—growing from $13 billion in ad spend in 2019 to roughly $41 billion last year in the US, according to Insider Intelligence—as retailers from Walmart to Dollar General to Best Buy have started or expanded their advertising networks.

Marketing Brew spoke with Feldman—who, as the son of a retail consultant, spent his childhood helping his dad audit Costco stores—ahead of the National Retail Federation’s annual dog-and-pony show this week about why some advertisers have shifted their budgets into retail media networks.

This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

How has the relationship changed between brands and their retail partners?

It is different in every scenario. I’ll put on my Jack Ryan hat here and say, “I’m going to follow the money.”

For brands looking to enter retail media and get more involved, yes, it unequivocally creates a deeper relationship with the retailer. Not only are they able to target more audiences from the retailer, it can break down purchase behaviors down to specific categories, brands, or even individual SKUs or products. Especially for CPG, but across categories, in many cases, the retailer has more data on the brand’s consumer than the brand itself.

If I’m marketing a seltzer and I already have a deal with a retailer that says I want some in-store advertising, how does digital retail media fit into my budget?

All brands handle it a little bit differently…Brands fund about a third of retail media from brand media budgets, a third from shopper marketing, and a third from e-commerce…What we recommend is looking at total value creation. What is the media return? What are any additional trading variables you get at the retailer, even things like IRI studies? Because retail media doesn’t just drive sales at that retailer; it drives total market sales as well.

Read the full interview here.—RB

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The holiday season is one of the most significant moments for retailers, bringing in nearly $800 billion annually.

But what happens after the holiday rush? Many businesses enter a so-called “post-holiday slump,” which can pose a serious financial challenge if they’re not prepared to combat it.

Don’t let that happen to you. Check out Retail Brew’s guide for quick tips on finding sales success in the new year.

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• Robinhood is starting a media outlet.
• Performance marketers are a hot hiring commodity, according to the Wall Street Journal.
• Peloton and Ulta have new CMOs.
• Netflix is “expected to report its slowest quarterly revenue growth” this week.
• E-Trade is returning to the Super Bowl.

Snap poll: Are you interested in using TikTok’s search ads?

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Quote: “The proposed API appears to maintain the status quo of inappropriate surveillance on the web, and we do not want to see it proceed further.”—Amy Guy, a member of the World Wide Web Consortium’s Technical Architecture Group, in a post about Google’s Topics proposal, via Insider

Stat: 16 years. That’s how long Ann Lewnes served as Adobe’s CMO before announcing her retirement. (The average tenure for the position is around three years.)

Read: “Noncompete clauses in advertising—how FTC’s proposed ban could impact the industry” (Ad Age)

Catch up on a few Marketing Brew stories you might have missed.

• Hiring demand for marketers could start to slow in 2023
• How Fly by Jing went from Kickstarter to Shake Shack partner
• Super Bowl: The game’s defining (ad) moments throughout history)