Paris Olympics Proving To Be At-Work Disruptor

NBCUniversal’s strategy of making all Paris Summer Olympics events available live is paying off with unexpectedly high daytime viewing, according to NextTV.

While that’s good news for the Comcast-owned broadcaster, it might not be great for other businesses. That’s because office productivity is down among Olympic viewers.

During a Thursday press briefing, NBCU said Tuesday’s early-afternoon coverage of women’s gymnastics averaged nearly 13 million viewers across NBC and Peacock, while Sunday’s 11:15 a.m. U.S.-Serbia men’s basketball game attracted 11 million viewers.

“I think where we’re pleasantly surprised that daytime viewership has been as high as it has been particularly on the weekdays,“ NBC Sports president Rick Cordella said. “It’s a point of work from home or summer. But that’s something that I don’t think has really happened in the past. 

“It’s great to see in the afternoon, Paris Prime, as we’ve called it, where we’ve seen enormous numbers,” he added. “Our strategy of making everything available live in the afternoon with fully produced, prime-time quality productions across our widest platforms, the biggest events, it’s something we’ve never done before.”

NBCU did some research and found that one in four Olympics viewers said their work productivity declined during the Olympics, said Molly Solomon, executive producer and president of NBC Olympics Production.

On top of that two in three people said the Olympics provide an escape, and half said they’ve changed their daily routine to to watch the Games.

“America is captivated and there’s a lack of productivity in a lot of workplaces and we’re here, ready for it,” Solomon said. “We set the goal early on to make sure that America is unproductive all day long.”

The daytime viewing doesn’t appear to be hurting primetime, where NBC is averaging 34 million viewers across all platforms, up 79% from Tokyo.