Page 73 - How To Get Rich

good friend Bob Wright, chairman and CEO of NBC, to tell him the
pageants might become available. I knew that NBC had recently acquired
Telemundo, and the pageants are huge in Latin markets. It looked like a
great opportunity for cross-promotion.

In the meantime, CBS had given up and allowed us free rein to get
back to the basics on the production and put more emphasis on what had
worked in the past: beautiful women. We also convinced them to schedule
the pageant for a night outside of the all-important ratings sweeps, which
would ensure more on-air promotions.
As a result, our 2002 Miss Universe pageant hit ratings gold. Overall,
it was number seven for the week and number one in demographics. The

pageant even trounced the NBA playoffs on NBC. The Miss Universe
pageant quickly became a very hot property.
I immediately sent a letter to Les Moonves telling him I was
exercising my option to buy out CBS. To my shock, Les took the position
that we had never agreed on an option. NBC was waiting in the wings, and
after a weeklong bidding war I bought out CBS and created a new

partnership with NBC.
At the first meeting of the new board, I asked the Miss Universe staff
to dust off some of the cross-promotional ideas they had pitched to CBS
over the years. Within minutes, Jeff Gaspin of NBC approved the
production of a Miss USAFear Factor to lead into the Miss USA telecast.
In addition, theToday show agreed to do five-minute live shots from each
pageant location. The results were amazing. For years the pageants had

tried to get a plug on the third-ratedCBS Morning Show and couldn’t get
as much as a returned phone call. Now they were getting major promotion
on the nation’s number one morning program and an Internet tie-in
through NBC.com.
The Miss USAFear Factor was the highest rated in the series and the

2003 Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants received the highest ratings
since I had bought the company. Additionally, the Telemundo simulcast of
the pageant was one of the highest-rated programs in the network’s history.
The cross-promotional concept I visualized in 1996 was finally
realized in 2003, and it never would have happened if I hadn’t been willing
to walk away from CBS, say no, and pursue a better opportunity
elsewhere.
The art of the hair.