Discovery's Taking Its Own Approach to Streaming
Discovery (NASDAQ: DISCA) has quietly made a big push into direct-to-consumer streaming video over the past year or so. While big media companies spend billions on original content and the rights to old TV episodes and films, Discovery is taking a slightly different approach. It's an approach that most resembles Disney's (NYSE: DIS) ESPN and its service ESPN+: Discovery wants to sell consumers extra content they can't get from a cable subscription.
That's most evident in its most recent service, Food Network Kitchen. The media company will offer cooking classes and food-related content from well-known food celebrities, including Bobby Flay, Rachael Ray, and Martha Stewart. It's basically capitalizing on its lineup of familiar personalities to sell subscriptions, not unlike how Disney uses its familiar characters. At the same time, just like Disney, Discovery is careful not to encroach on its big moneymaker -- pay TV distribution fees -- by not offering the same content available on its cable network.
Discovery, however, doesn't have the same mass appeal as Disney, which requires it to make other considerations in its strategy.
Source Fool.com
