QVC briefly suspended live programming tonight on both live channels due to Tornado Warning. When Q2 returned to live programming at 6:45PM host Steve Doss apologized and explained they had to shelter due to the tornado warning. QVC is located in Westchester, PA in Chester County. Chester County had a Tornado Warning from just after 6PM until 6:45.
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QVC briefly suspended live programming tonight
- Thread starter MarcB
- Start date
Better to be safe than sorry - and that goes not only for the host, but for all the staff and crew who are on-site as well. The sale of overpriced trinkets can wait, generic sales programming can be aired during the stoppage and any potential lost sales can be recouped. Lives can't.
This must've been a local thing because they would NEVER do that nationally. That's why networks have studios in different places around the U.S. (And in the case of the the news channels, the world)
QVC is centralized and I don't believe there are other studios. They don't have local operations. Even if they could switch to a different studio in another market, they don't have sets, the current merchandise and the hosts there.
News channels may have back-up capability, but their anchors and production staffs are centralized. A news channel or one of the Big Three networks can originate a show from another location, but they don¿t have a full staff of writers and producers and the rest at multiple locations 24/7.
Yes, they could do temporary fill. They could relocate the support staff elsewhere in the event of a building fire or storm or flood or quake, but it would be provisional while the logistics of getting the full staff relocated or online.
The Big Three and the cable news operations have all their files, audio and video backed up elsewhere, but getting the full news gathering and writing and producing relocated is not just a flip of a switch. For example, if a hurricane is to hit New York City, they can prepare days in advance... but it is a lot of work.
CNN, Fox, MSNBC and the others can't originate their US content from outside the US. They may have correspondents in London or Tokyo or elsewhere, but they can't "take over" origination that way for the same reason of not having the support staff
QVC broadcasts from their HQ in Pennsylvania. Channels like QVC, HSN and JTV aren't "networks" per se with broadcast facilities and studios in multiple cities. That said, they have enough "generic" merchandise they sell at all times that isn't part of their daily specials and isn't at risk of selling out within a particular segment, so they can roll generic video roll featuring those items when there are technical problems or when they can't broadcast live for some reason.
Good point. But if the whole studio complex is closed down, as in this example, they might roll a video segment before taking shelter or evacuating, but could they continue to do this remotely from a laptop or iPad or whatever?
In the case of a news channel, they could fill with one of the weekend specials, but it would be hard to continue covering breaking news until staff and anchors were assembled at a remote location and scripts prepared and so on.
I'd suggest in the modern age, most of the news channels could operate from New York or Washington, with relatively short notice. I remember not so long ago there was a suspicious package found at CNN's office in New York, and they were only in special programs for less than an hour. I think in that case, they used a satellite truck from the street in NYC.
That's a good example of what I was referring to. It would take some amount of time, proportional to the wealth and size of the organization, to get back on from a different location.
The biggest problem in temporarily originating from another city is that the talent, writers and support staff are not there and, even if working from laptops and cell phones, they don't have all the right staff in the right places.
In the case of a shopping channel, it is unlikely they have much of any redundancy in another location.
interestingly, if we somehow lost our tower but our studio and internet remained ok, i could get KSKO back on air from another locaiton in town within about 2 hours as long as i had a flat roof and good internet access
Also not all Guest back in Studio so can have just Guest on QVC Channels to present product.
Uh, what?
I would think QVC could run prerecorded programming for a while without it becoming a major problem. Alternately they might to try to find a way to broadcast from their sister network HSN studios although as David pointed out they wouldn’t immediately have their merchandise.
A few weeks ago an alarm (probably a fire alarm) went off at Philly’s Audacy headquarters bulldog so they had to evacuate building for about 20 minutes I had on KYW Newsradio which started broadcasting prerecorded news from the night before (presumably the prerecorded portion they air from 2-5 AM) with a periodic message due to technical difficulties they are airing special programming. I assume talk radio WPHT snd sports talk WIP had to do something similar.
A few weeks ago an alarm (probably a fire alarm) went off at Philly’s Audacy headquarters bulldog so they had to evacuate building for about 20 minutes I had on KYW Newsradio which started broadcasting prerecorded news from the night before (presumably the prerecorded portion they air from 2-5 AM) with a periodic message due to technical difficulties they are airing special programming. I assume talk radio WPHT snd sports talk WIP had to do something similar.
I can give you an insider's perspective from JTV. First of all, the place is Fort Knox. No windows, and built to survive anything. Ir contains studios, call center and shipping. In the unlikely event there was a reason to evacuate (bomb threat?) they would probably air a rerun (which they do if hosts are sick and there's no quick replacement). People would still be able to order on the automated system. They also do reruns in the wee hours of the weekends. Most of the merchandise is sold out, but.....
In the early days of Covid, management was trying to make sure officials would consider us an "essential business". They offered that they could convert the shipping operation to shipping ventilators if necessary and since we had a national TV presence, we could broadcast emergency messages. The chances of that actually happening.....well.
In the early days of Covid, management was trying to make sure officials would consider us an "essential business". They offered that they could convert the shipping operation to shipping ventilators if necessary and since we had a national TV presence, we could broadcast emergency messages. The chances of that actually happening.....well.
I'm sure it works like JTV; guests hosts are there to present their products. During COVID all those guest segments were zoomed in since we banned travel in and out
I think they were trying to say that even though not all guests are back in studio, they can have some guests on the QVC channels to present the products?
They did air pre-recorded programming during the Tornado Warning just like QVC normally does 3AM-7AM, Q2 does Midnight-11AM, and QVC 3 does 24/7.
QVC 3 is best of.