TVNewser reported on the big drop in young people tuning into Faux News, “Compared to 2012, Faux News was down -5% in total viewers and -19% in the A25-54 demographic in total day. In prime-time, the network was down -14% in total viewers and -30% in the demo, the steepest decline among younger viewers of all the cable news networks.”
2012 was a presidential election year, so all three cable news networks lost viewers in 2013. The difference is that at Faux News this problem has been going on for years. The move of Maygun Kelly to 9 PM was supposed to attract young viewers, but Kelly suffered a drop 23% in young viewership compared to Sean Handjob’s 2012 ratings. Swiill O’Really is down 23% with younger viewers, and Handjob is down 16%.
Faux knows that this is a serious problem. It’s the reason why they shook up their primetime schedule. The reality is that Faux News has the oldest audience in all television. The average age of a Faux News viewer is 65 years old. FNC can remain the ratings leader in the short term future as long as the senior set keeps tuning in, but what happens when there aren’t enough young people tuning in to replace the elderly audience?
If Faux News fails to build a future audience, they will go extinct. It would have been unfathomable in early 1990s to suggest that one day CNN would be the least watched cable news network, but that is exactly what has happened. Beneath all of the arrogant swagger and bragging, Faux News has a huge problem.
It isn’t just that younger people aren’t watching. They are flat out rejecting Faux News. Just like the repugican cabal, Faux News is aging and fading. Attempts to rebrand are going nowhere, as young news consumers have been turned off by Faux.
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