Friends essay

The television industry has been one of the most popular industries that Hollywood has used in order to entertain people since the mid 1920s. People use television as a way to escape their world, whether it is watching the newest drama, sitcom, or even reality television show. This popular industry has become increasingly popular in the 21st century, as nearly every household owns at least one television. The three major roles in the television industry, being production, distribution, and transmission, have produced great sums of revenue because of how popular the industry really is. The industry is a continuous cycle, in which production companies need to come up with creative ideas, which involves a great amount of risk. This idea is then sold to networks and channels, where they have to strategically set up schedules so that their program has the greatest chance of reaching their target audience. The final step of this cycle involves transmission companies, which actually allows viewers to watch shows. Examples of how this is done are broadcasting, cable, or satellite, which physically allow viewers to watch shows. This cycle is continuous, as production is always looking for distributors, who are looking for transmission companies, and so on.
The economic situation of television shows vary greatly, as each show chooses different stations to broadcast their show on, and each show has a different showrunner. One of the most popular television shows in history, Friends, is a great television show to study the economic situation of a show, and how the economics of the show have affected the television industry. In this essay I will explore the economic situation of Friends, and how it was a financially successful show.
Friends first premiered in 1994, using the typical Pilot episode in order to win over their audience. In this episode the six main characters, who were all in their mid-twenties, were introduced, and a bit of their background surrounding them was also introduced. Monica, who is a chef, is portrayed as a single woman trying to find love in New York City. Her brother Ross, just found out his lesbian ex-wife was pregnant with his child. His college roommate Chandler, who works in a job that none of the other friends can ever seem to remember, also seems like he is doomed to a loveless life, as his quirky nature can never seem to land a girl. His roommate, Joey, is an aspiring actor who thinks he will make it big, even though he has never landed himself a real role. He does seem to be very lucky with the women, charming many women in the pilot episode. Monica’s old roommate Phoebe, who is also a very odd character, acts as a free spirit, seemingly going with the flow in life. Rachel is introduced as she runs into the coffee shop in a wedding dress, after walking out on her wedding day. She is Monica’s old best friend from high school, and portrayed as a spoiled Manhattan young adult in the first episode. The series goes on to deal with the lives of these six very different characters, as their love lives, their jobs, and their personal friendships morph and grow over the ten seasons. As the show progresses, four out of the six main characters find themselves in love with each other, and go on to start their own families. The emphasis on family in this show is very strong, as the six friends consider themselves a family of their own, and we as the audience get to experience the trials and tribulations this family goes through together. After ten seasons, the show finally came to an end, leaving the audience with a feeling of new beginnings for the friends, all starting new chapters of their lives. They were no longer the twenty something single friends; they were a family that was ready to move on to the next part of their lives.
The hit sitcom Friends was one of the most successful shows of all time, as it had at least 14 million viewers every season (Wikipedia, 2013). Kevin Bright, who is a successful American executive producer, was the showrunner for Friends. The idea of the show, which was six people in their twenties trying to make their way in Manhattan, was pitched to NBC, and NBC saw that this show had potential, so they agreed to run a put pilot. This type of pilot ensures that it will air on the network, and if the network chooses not to air it they will incur financial penalties. NBC saw that this show had potential and they did not want to turn down the chance to make a profit on it. Lucky for them, Friends was a major success in the television industry. It had cultural and economic success, making Friends one of the most popular series of this generation. It not only reached the target audience of the ‘twenty somethings’ that the characters were portraying, but it reached many age groups that the network did not initially think it would. The second season all the way through to the tenth season, Friends was always in the top five most watched shows, hitting its peak in the eighth season when it was the number one watched show (Wikipedia, 2013).
There is often confusion surrounding the company that distributes the television program, the company that broadcasts the show, and the company that actually produces the television program. In the instance of Friends, NBC is the broadcaster for the show, NBC and Warner Brothers Television are the distributors for the show, and the production companies for the show are Bright/Kauffman/Crane Productions as well as Warner Brothers Television. When there was discussion of ending this show after the eighth season, NBC did not want this to happen, so they did what they thought was appropriate in order to get two more seasons. The amount of money that NBC paid Warner Brothers was the highest price that the television industry had ever seen for a thirty-minute show, which was ten million dollars for the production of each episode in the tenth season. NBC believed that they would be able to make this money back from advertising revenue, but this did not happen. Friends did secure themselves a spot on primetime television though, Thursday nights from 8:00pm until 8:30pm (IMDb, 2013). This then brought ratings and profits to other television series on the NBC network, so they did get their moneys worth with the deal they made with Warner Brothers.
When the series ended in 2004, people thought this would be the end of Friends, but in fact, the show can still be seen in reruns on television today. In 2001, Warner Brothers made a deal with TBS, which is also owned by Time Warner, that gave them the rights to air reruns on their channel. TBS has recently renewed this contract with Warner Brothers until 2017, paying 275,000 dollars per episode. Warner Brothers has also sold cable rights to Nick at Nite, which happened in 2011. They were paying 500,000 dollars per episode and airing the show after six pm (Madger, 2004). Until 2005, syndication, which is the sale of the right to broadcast television shows by multiple television stations, Friends has earned 944 million dollars.
The above statistics show just how much of an impact Friends has made on the television industry. Economically, this show changed sitcoms and the way sitcoms were produced. Producers that came after Friends were compared to this show, and if they fell short there was no way they would ever profit as much as Friends did. After the finale of Friends, Kevin Bright went onto being the showrunner of a spinoff series entitled Joey, which was based around the life of Joey from Friends. This show was also aired on NBC, Thursday nights from 8:00pm until 8:30pm (Wikipedia). Because of the popularity of Friends, NBC decided to air this in a primetime slot. This show was not nearly as successful, even though there were still many viewers. The timeslot in the second season was changed to Tuesdays at 8:00pm, which was in the same timeslot as Fox’s American Idol. Ratings dropped dramatically, and the show was cancelled shortly thereafter. The key thing to take away from this was the relationship NBC had formed with Kevin Bright, and the confidence they had in him. Because of the success of Friends, they saved a primetime slot for him. Because of Friends, the audience gave the show a fair shot as people still watched the show, while admitting they did not enjoy what they were watching. Friends was so successful because of the dynamic relationship formed between six people, and a spinoff would not compare.
There were a couple of episodes in particular that product placement benefitted outside companies greatly. In the pilot episode, there was so much talk around Oreo cookies, and the characters were seen eating Oreos. Oreos were also seen in many episodes after the pilot. Oreo was new to product placement in the 1990s, and did not really recognize the potential that it could impact their business, but they saw sales rise, especially days after they were featured in episodes of Friends. The greatest product placement in Friends though, was the episode all about Pottery Barn. In this episode, Rachel models her whole apartment to an exact replica of a Pottery Barn catalogue. The store is featured in this episode, and many of their products are also featured. Since the episodes air in syndication, “every time this episode is aired again, the phones light up with catalogue requests” (Russell, 2006). Product placement has proven to be very effective, and Friends used this to their advantage. Because the show was so popular, other companies would pay large sums of money to have their product displayed in an episode, even if it was just for a short time. The pay off that the companies may gain had potential to be huge, because of the added benefit that the show is still in reruns today.
The emergence of the television industry changed the way in which audiences spent their spare time. As years have passed, the television industry has become even more popular. Audiences for certain genres of shows have increased, while other genres may not be as popular anymore. Production, distribution and transmission have all affected the way in which the television industry is run as well. Certain companies may own the rights to a television show, but another company may own the rights to broadcasting a show. The popular sitcom Friends may be one of the most popular sitcoms our generation will ever see. Reaching such a large target audience, NBC capitalized on this when they first signed the deal with Kevin Bright. NBC and Warner Brothers both made vast amounts of money from this show, and continue to profit from it because of the syndication rights they have sold. Television shows such as Friends prove just how economically successful a show has the potential to be, and it illustrates how dramatic an impact the television industry can have on society.

Works Cited
“Friends” IMDB. Internet Movie Data Base. Web. 7 Oct. 2013.
“Friends.” Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. Web. 7 Oct. 2013.
Madger, Ted. “The end of TV 101.” Reality Programs, Formats, and the New Business of Television 7.4 (2004): 137-152. Web. 7 October 2013.
Russell, A. “Investigating the Effectiveness of Product Placements in Television Shows.” Journal of Consumer Research 29.3 (2006): 79-95. Web. 7 October 2013.

Cited: “Friends” IMDB. Internet Movie Data Base. Web. 7 Oct. 2013. “Friends.” Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. Web. 7 Oct. 2013. Madger, Ted. “The end of TV 101.” Reality Programs, Formats, and the New Business of Television 7.4 (2004): 137-152. Web. 7 October 2013. Russell, A. “Investigating the Effectiveness of Product Placements in Television Shows.” Journal of Consumer Research 29.3 (2006): 79-95. Web. 7 October 2013.