05/11/2026
Remember when TV upfronts felt like the Super Bowl of advertising?
This week, the television networks are holding their upfront presentations in New York. For decades, this was where media executives, buyers, agencies, and affiliates gathered to get a first look at the big new fall shows and lock in advertising commitments for the season ahead.
How times have changed.
Today, much of the excitement has moved online. Paramount/CBS has shifted away from the traditional New York upfront format. Streaming is part of every conversation. Viewers are scattered across cable, apps, YouTube, social platforms, FAST channels, and whatever service they remembered to subscribe to this month.
And one of NBC’s new programming headlines? A reboot of The Rockford Files.
For those of us over 40, the video landscape is almost unrecognizable. For advertisers, that is not necessarily bad news — but it does mean the old playbook no longer works on its own.
The real question is no longer, “What show should we buy?”
It is, “Where is our customer actually watching, scrolling, searching, and making decisions?”
That is where the strategy begins.
