Future Today Adds Original Competition Series To Fawesome Free Streaming Service

Fawesome Family Game Show

Ad-supported streaming company Future Today has decided it is time to add its first two original competition series to the programming lineup of its Fawesome channel.

The shows, Southern Food Truck Wars and Fawesome Family Game Show, mark an inflection point for Fawesome and Future Today, as well as for the free ad-supported streaming business, which has mostly lived off acquired content.

“From a scale standpoint, we were big enough where this could potentially make sense,” Vikrant Mathur, co-founder of Future Today, told TVRev. Mathur wouldn’t disclose viewing metrics, but said Fawesome was being seen by tens of millions of users.

At the same time, Future Today is competing for eyeballs and ad dollars with a growing streaming business, from Netflix and Disney+ to Tubi and Pluto TV. Many services offer a lot of the same licensed titles as they got off the ground and rode the streaming wave.

In order to continue to defend their share of viewing and grow, “you really have to give viewers a reason to come to your app,” Mathur said. “And content’s a big part of that.”

Original shows are a way of differentiating Fawesome from its streaming rivals with viewers. ”Also it’s a way for us to have more meaningful conversations with our brand and agency partners, because they are also looking for uniqueness, for differentiation, how they can make sense of the different publishers,” he said. “So it gives us another opportunity to talk to these brands and figure out if there’s ways for us to help them connect with the audiences they’re seeking in a more meaningful way.”

At a time when more video ads are being bought and sold programmatically, Mathur says its direct sales effort is important. When Amazon Prime Video began showing ads to all subscribers unless they opted out, it flooded the market with inventory, and ad prices fell.

Mathur acknowledged seeing downward pressure on pricing on a cost-per-thousand viewers (CPM) basis, but said it was most pronounced on the programmatic side of its business. “The opportunity for us is in direct sales, which is becoming a bigger part of our monetization mix.”

The new shows are available for users to stream, but they don’t yet have dedicated sponsors. At this point “this is more of an experimental thing for us. We just wanted to get our feet wet,” he said. Fawesome will be rolling out more original content this year “and we’re having conversations about sponsorships.”

Southern Food Truck Wars is a six-episode series that takes place in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where food trucks compete for the title of Southern Food Truck Champion. The show is hosted by TV chef Jay Ducote and features a panel of judges including Ducote, Joshua K. Carpenter, Tameeka Stewart and Darrell Freeman. The winning truck receives $1,000, a $5,000 advertising package as well as the champion title.

Fawesome Family Game Show is hosted by LaTangela Fay, with two teams competing in fast-paced games inspired by classics like Pictionary, Boggle, Scrabble and Family Feud. The winner of each episode walks away with a $1,000 cash prize.

Image courtesy of Future Today

The shows were created by Aaron L. Williams of Digital Media Studios and Joshua K. Carpenter of Global Content.

"These shows represent a fresh take on beloved competition formats,” Williams said. “With Southern Food Truck Wars, we're celebrating the rich culinary traditions of the South through the lens of modern food truck culture, while Fawesome Family Game Show brings a dynamic, new energy to classic games that families already love. Bringing these two shows to life has been a rewarding journey, and there is no better home for them than Fawesome."

The shows will be promoted on the Fawesome app, with some advertising on platforms including the smart TV set makers that carry the channel.

Mathur acknowledges that the series are not exactly big-budget epics like Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings. “Not everything you produce needs to be for the mass market,” Mathur said. Fawesome is looking for shows that will give it an identity and fill a need in the market that’s not currently being met.

Fawesome last year started streaming original content, starting with the films Greenwood Rising: The Rise of Black Wall Street and The Peanut Man. And Future Today’s HappyKids streaming service already produces animated series and has its own studio.

To some degree this looks like the early days of the cable business, when networks were launched, got distribution and scale, then launched original programming to differentiate their brands and attract better ad rates.

“Broadly speaking, we are not trying to reinvent the business model per se, at least from a production and distribution standpoint,” Mathur said. “I feel like from a business standpoint, it’s the same stuff over again. The delivery mechanism has changed.”

Netflix has proven that streaming can be a very profitable business. “I don’t think anybody is not jealous of Netflix, including the HBOs and Disney+s of the world. But I credit Netflix and Roku with creating this business,” he said. “There was no reason for any MVPD to do it, or a traditional network to do it. They were all very happy making money the way they were.

“So credit where it’s due to Netflix and Roku paving the way and creating an opportunity for all of us, especially in the ad-supported space. There’s a lot of money that’s going to be flowing in both the traditional linear budgets as well as digital ad business because [streaming] marries the best of both worlds,” he said.

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