"F*ck That's Delicious": Getting Younger Audiences to Watch Old Formats

I’ll declare this with full confidence— Parts Unknown with Anthony Bourdain will always be one of the best travel food shows to ever grace television. It’s been a little over two years since Bourdain’s tragic passing (R.I.P. to a legend), but I’ve been slowly filling the hole in my heart with a newer travel food show: F*ck That’s Delicious.

Viceland’s F*ck That’s Delicious is a travel food documentary show hosted by former chef/current rapper Action Bronson. The series follows Bronson and his crew as they eat and travel the world-- visiting both fine dining restaurants and local joints -- while Bronson tours for his music.

F*ck That’s Delicious is a part of Vice’s “Munchies” brand -- described as “an alternative to the studio-based “cook-off” formats that have dominated food programming on traditional TV networks - shows that its promo video calls “dull, bland and flat-out boring to the group that matters most in food: young people”. Fitting to the brand, Bronson’s food show is not just about the food, but showcases the rapper’s lifestyle as well. The series is filled with drinking, smoking, and banter between Bronson and his crew.

Four seasons of the show have aired on Viceland, with 38 episodes out so far-- and 7 of those being a part of the ongoing fourth season. On average, each season has about a 10 episode order, give or take. With a four-season order for Vice— this show has been doing pretty well.

Target Demographic

The show, which was originally a Vice webseries, was adapted for television and put on the media company’s network Viceland. F*ck That’s Delicious appeals to the Vice target demographic-- described as “young, affluent and well-educated” who usually “dodge ads both online and on TV” by Guy Slattery, the President of Viceland, in their 2017 upfront. According to Nielsen, Viceland has received 60,000 viewers on average in primetime in Q1 of 2017 with viewers ages 18-49. In a viewer profile published by firm Effectv, 48% of Viceland viewers are 18-34 and 50% are 35-54. The largest target lifestyle group watching the network is described as “Young City Solos”. Further, 68% of viewers are male.

Marketing Strategies

Action Bronson’s personal brand already has a large following, and with over 340K Twitter followers and 1.6M Instagram followers, Bronson’s promotion for the show as talent is a key marketing strategy. However, the show is marketed not only as a food show but as a part of a lifestyle desired by the target demographic, and Vice shows often team up with brands to sell this. For example, Action Bronson and Morgenstern’s Finest Ice Cream collaborated to produce limited-edition merchandise to promote the show, which quickly sold out.

Types of Ads

Viceland’s approach to ads for their shows is to “reduc(e) ad loads with an emphasis on native advertising, which Vice creates to look more like editorial content.” According to Adweek, Viceland programming only shows eight minutes of national ad time and two minutes of local time per hour. Instead, Viceland tries to replace the 30-second pre-produced ad spots with integration opportunities and custom partnerships between brands and Vice shows.

*Neither Vice nor Viceland ad rates are publicly available.

So now that we’ve gotten past all of those figures and factoids, what does it all mean for Bronson and Viceland?

F*ck That’s Delicious has rated well for Vice. On average, each episode posted to the Munchies Youtube channel gets over a million views. However, year by year, the Viceland network has been losing viewership and has been slowly shifting from lifestyle programming (such F*ck That’s Delicious) to news. However, F*ck That’s Delicious is now available on Hulu following an exclusive Vice/Hulu partnership established in 2018, giving Hulu over 150 hours of Vice Programming for SVOD— providing a sort of longevity for the show.

Nonetheless, F*ck That’s Delicious is currently airing season 4 on Vice-- the last season of the show. The show will not return for a fifth season, as Action Bronson’s contract ends in March and will not be renewed following internal disputes between Bronson and the network. Bronson elaborated in an interview with radio show Hot 97 that among his grievances with Vice included Vice only promoting his show, however neglecting his music. In my purely editorial opinion, there’s more to be said on this. One of the main draws to Vice in the eyes of their audience is loyalty to key talent (and with Viceland, notable names such as Bronson or chef and author Eddie Huang not only entertain but also keep dedicated fans around). Though the nuances of negotiations between Bronson and Vice ultimately remain between the two parties, it will be interesting to see if Viceland will be able to maintain their original audience now that they are losing an important talent to the network.

This transition of programming and the Viceland development mandate may point towards an appeal to the audience that actually watches linear television. While it’s idealistic to label the Viceland viewer as woke and young— the fact of the matter is that (especially now, in the age of streaming) this specific demographic described by Slattery probably mainly tunes in through Youtube or streaming.

Perhaps it is the best move for Viceland to shift away from these lifestyle shows right now. However, if we look at F*ck That’s Delicious through the lens of a bigger picture, the cult-ish popularity of Bronson mixed with the tired-and-traditional format of a travel food show may the way to hook in the next generation of viewers and revive a format that seems to have been done to death.