The War of 18-49, White Collar

WHITE COLLAR (USA)

Scheduling history: White Collar debuted back in the days when USA Network was still programming high-priority shows on Fridays. It led out of the final episodes of Monk on Friday, then took a one-month break before returning on Tuesday. It stayed on Tuesday through season four, consistently airing at 9:00 in the summer and 10:00 in the winter. The last two seasons marked a return to airing entirely in the broadcast regular season, on Thursday at 9/8c.

See (who saw) how it all began: For several years in a row, USA Network's series premieres consistently placed somewhere in the low-to-mid-1's in the demo. White Collar was one of those, beginning its post-Monk run on 10/23/09 with 5.40 million viewers and a 1.4 demo. (Monk had a nearly identical 5.41m and 1.5.) It mostly dropped into the low 1's from there, but it spiked to a 1.6 on Monk's series finale night of 12/4/09 (when Monk had a 2.4).

The best of times: White Collar became a younger-skewing show when it moved to Tuesday away from Monk, and it took that entire 1.6 demo into its Tuesday premiere on 1/19/10. It dropped back to its typical low 1's level after that, a level it was able to maintain with incredible consistency through all of season two and into the first half of season three.

The worst of times: Starting in the second half of season three, White Collar began declining significantly, a trend that continued all the way through season five. It never hit a 0.5 in the first four seasons, but it was a fairly regular occurrence for the show in the first two thirds of season five, and it never even got that high in season six until the finale. The low point was a 0.32 for the second season six episode on 11/13/14.

Then vs. now: In the Royal Pains post I noted the glaring difference between these two shows when both appeared to be "in their prime" circa 2010-11. Royal Pains had a noticeably larger audience in the summer, but White Collar held up much more effectively against regular season competition. USA has now gotten the scheduling right; Royal Pains begins its second straight summer-only season, while White Collar didn't premiere season five until the fall. But they didn't reap the same kind of benefits they'd have seen if they'd done this two or three years earlier, as both shows faded in all parts of the year in their closing seasons.

Adults 18-49 info by season:

Seas	Year	Timeslot	Avg	y2y	Lo	Hi	Results	Grade
1	2009-10	Friday 10:00	1.24		0.9	1.6	detail
2A	Summer 2010	Tuesday 9:00	1.26		1.0	1.5	detail
2B	Winter 2011	Tuesday 10:00	1.23	-1%	1.1	1.3
3A	Summer 2011	Tuesday 9:00	1.22	-3%	1.1	1.5	detail
3B	Winter 2012	Tuesday 10:00	0.91	-26%	0.7	1.1
4A	Summer 2012	Tuesday 9:00	0.99	-19%	0.9	1.2	detail
4B	Winter 2013	Tuesday 10:00	0.73	-19%	0.6	0.9
5	2013-14	Thursday 9:00	0.63	-15%	0.5	0.8	detail	C+
6	2014-15		0.39	-38%	0.3	0.5	detail	D-

Historical-adjusted ratings by season:

Seas	Year	A18-49+	Label	Now	y2y	Lo	Hi	Premiere	Finale
1	2009-10	45				32	57	50	50
2A	Summer 2010	45				36	54	43	50
2B	Winter 2011	49				44	51	51	51
3A	Summer 2011	48				43	59	48	59
3B	Winter 2012	38				31	47	47	31
4A	Summer 2012	42				37	49	44	43
4B	Winter 2013	35				31	41	41	31
5	2013-14	33				25	41	32	40
6	2014-15	23*				19*	27*	23*	27*

*- For this winter's War of 18-49 updates, the A18-49+ is based on a projected league average, calculated by applying the league average's current year-to-year trend (thru 1/18/15) to the final 2013-14 average. This should help make these numbers compare more fairly with seasons past.

For more on The War of 18-49, my look at the history of primetime TV's veteran shows, see the Index.