I want to turn my bar into a sports bar and show sporting events on TV
screens throughout the bar.  There will be no admittance charge to get
into the bar and there will be no drink minimum.  I will bring the
sporting events to the TVs via satellite or cable feeds.  I need to
find out if there are royalty fees that need to be paid for showing
sporting events in a bar when there is no admission fee and no drink
minimum.  If royalty fees are required, I need to know what those fees
are, and how I am to pay them.

---

Request for Question Clarification by darrel-ga on 31 Oct 2002 16:36 PST

Hello--

Where would this bar be located?

darrel-ga

Hello tomm123,

Thanks for a very interesting question!

I went to the DirectTV web site and looked for their contact page to
verify what I thought might be the case. I called and spoke to a
Business Service Representative that assured me that there were no
additional fees or royalties for broadcasting sports in public places
such as sports bars other than their package plans designed for
exactly this purpose.

http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/aboutus/ContactUs.jsp

Their page dedicated to business accounts can be found at
http://www.directv.com/DTVAPP/buy/Business_Bar.jsp and here they note:

Bars and Restaurants

"Don't settle for the limited selection on cable or invest in a
cumbersome, expensive C-band satellite system. Get DIRECTV® service
and enjoy more than twice as many channels as most cable systems, plus
sports programming unavailable on C-band. DIRECTV programming offers
reliable signal strength with digital-quality picture and sound and
the best customer service in the bar and restaurant business -- 24
hours a day, seven days a week.

Our Public Viewing Packages bring your customers the best in
satellite-delivered television -- and bring them back to your
establishment again and again. Call 1-888-200-4388 for more
information."

Packages for bars and restaurants can be found in pdf format at
http://www.directv.com/buy/pdf/public_rates.pdf. You will note that
they are sold based on the fire code occupancy of your facility.

For example, a bar that can hold 201-500 occupants would pay $2,499
per season for NFL Sunday ticket, $1,249 for ESPN GamePlan, $1,999 for
NBA League Pass, $1,399 for NHL Center ICE and so forth. Additional
packages are available for local programming as well as entertainment
channels, though at considerably less expensive rates than for the
sports packages. The pdf document will provide extensive details, or,
DirectTV will fax you a copy if you prefer, at your request.

I strongly suspected that cable would operate in a very similar
manner, but called AT&T Broadband Cable to check on their policies at
1-800-824-2000. I assume most other companies will operate similalry
in other areas.

Amazingly enough, there are no royalties, fees or regulations for
presenting any broadcast over their cable in a public facility other
than your monthly fee, the number of converters and outlets needed and
initial installation.

AT&T has a number of digital packages which can include NBA and NHL
Season passes at a reasonable $159 each. The other packages that can
be accessed from DirectTV are not available from AT&T at this time.
However, you local cable provider may have more or less options
available.

I trust this answers your question about fees and royalties for public
viewing of sports broadcasts. If anything above is unclear, please do
ask for additional information.

Best regards,

-=clouseau=-

I got a COMPLETE answer to my question.