Ratings Discussion Thread

[Refractive Reflections]

Originally Posted by neatoman

You know, the idea that toy sales are more important than ratings has always kind of bugged me. If the toyline fails, fine, maybe it's a bit annoying of a reason but it where the funding is expected to come from, but the toy sales being more important than the ratings themselves? I don't buy it, if the toyline were to do far better than the show, why continue the show ? If it's not a big ratings draw, it's just bad for the network and an pointless expense for the toy company, just continue the toyline without the show in that case. If more people are buying the toys than those who are watching the show, then clearly the interest for the toys do not come from the show.

Also, I would like to see the numbers for the toy sales, this thread is all about numbers is it not?

The situation is also a bit mystifying for me too. The fandom keeps pointing out to this particular thread (and its solitary article) with the toy line being so "massively" successful, yet as impressive as the figure is, it doesn't mean much when there isn't a quantitative comparison to other toy franchises to rank just how successful the toy line is with the current competition. (It makes as much sense as boasting about an individual that can run a mile within 9 minutes, but if you don't have the numbers of the competition to compare it to, or have it in the right perspective [for example if the individuals are healthy or sick, an athlete or untrained, an adult or a child], the result doesn't mean much by itself.) Typically, merchandise sales parallel the audience reception of the show/movie itself, so it's bizarre how the article gives the impression of how big toy sales are when the viewership has been lukewarm at best.

For all we know in explaining this phenomenon, a big chuck of the merchandise success could be driven more by adult collectors and nostalgia interests rather than children (the targeted demographic) actually wanting the merchandise itself. It's odd to say the least that a greater proportion want to strictly buy TMNT merchandise (whether it's solely Nick's merchandise or not is unclear), but yet less and less people want to watch the Nick show.