The will of the workers is to end up being part of Barça Studios, the audiovisual production company of the Barcelona club, a fact that the Camp Nou offices have admitted to this newspaper that is considered as an option. The current contract with Telefónica ends in June 2023. “Since Barça Studios was born, it was seen that the best way to manage the club’s audiovisual production was to integrate everything, under the same conditions and working together” , a source familiar with the project tells ARA. “But it is difficult because of an issue of labor liabilities. Many of the workers have been at Barça TV for more than 15 years and no human resources department would want to take on this responsibility. In fact, in 2021 it was planned that they would become part of Barça Studios, but the club’s crisis prevented that”, he continues.
Another person who has also been part of the club admits, for his part, that this matter “is a hot potato that has been passed over by the various boards of directors” and considers that Barça TV workers “morally and ethically are already of Barça” and that “it is normal that now they also want to be legally”.
Barça does not increase the budget
In this matter, Telefónica is a service provider for Barça, which is responsible for setting the budget for the Spanish multinational. “The club has given the same budget to Telefónica since the contract began seven years ago. But, on the other hand, every year Barça asks for more: more programs, more content, more direct, more special envoys and more staff. TBSC is subject to the money that Barça gives it”, says this same ex-employee of the club. According to ARA, Barça TV costs the Barcelona club around 7.9 million euros annually. Most of it, 6.4 million, is paid to Telefónica (to whom the production and salary of the channel cost 5.5) and the rest, 1.5, is to pay for the DTT multiplex.
Business model
“They have a very good human team. The problem is that they are working on a regional product aimed at club members via DTT. But the fact that the product is not good is not the fault of the workers, but of the club’s board of directors who want them to make this type of product”, explains a former manager. Barça TV can only be viewed over-the-air in Catalonia and via digital payment platforms throughout Spain. And in 2020, Barça TV+ was born, the club’s paid OTT, which can be watched from anywhere in the world via the internet. “Barça TV+ was born to make it global. With this vision, it does make sense to have a club television, because you reach people who in their territory do not have access to media that can explain the day-to-day life of Barça”, he adds. For his part, the ex-employee considers that “Barça TV is only sustainable if you understand it as a corporate communication tool, which has a cost and losses, as can happen with any other club department”.
Barça TV, the answer to Real Madrid TV
Barça TV began broadcasting on July 27, 1999 under the name Canal Barça (it was called that until February 2004), during the presidency of Josep Lluís Núñez. Shortly before, on February 14, 1999, Real Madrid Television had been born, under the mandate of Lorenzo Sanz. “They are channels of corporate communication at the service of the president of duty. It is an interesting tool for power, through which it can give its version of events. But Barça TV exists because Real Madrid Televisión exists”, explains a person who has experienced the development of the channel from the inside. “Club televisions like those of Barça and Real Madrid are something very special in world football. The closest one is Bayern Munich”, he adds.
Today, one of the most important differences between the two is that Real Madrid Televisión is broadcast over the air in all of Spain and Barça TV only in Catalonia. Therefore, the cost of the DTT multiplex for the white club is higher, 4 million euros per year. “But this greater diffusion allows it to have larger audiences and reach the threshold to enter the advertising campaigns of television agencies. The explanation of the broadcast of the films of western strange is to increase the audience with this objective”, he says.
