Did network daytime reruns hurt potential syndication sales?

From the '50s-'80s, it was quite common for a network to rerun a primetime show during the daytime hours. Some of those series stayed in network daytime repeats for years, running thru each episode many times. A few even stayed in daytime even after primetime runs had ended.

Once the network was finished with them and these series were available for syndication, did the fact that they were on in daytime hurt the syndie sales?

One case in point: Bewitched. It was syndicated in the fall of 1973. Although this was always on a Toronto station, nearby Buffalo didn't pick up the reruns until March, 1976. The ABC affiliate, Channel 7 aired the network daytime repeats for five years, from Jan 1968 - June 1973. Maybe none of the stations picked it up for so long is because all the episodes were run thru many times already(?) Independent Channel 29 was the one that finally aired it.

I'm sure there are a lot of other examples of this in other cities with other shows, but this is the first one that comes to mind.

Anyone have any thoughts?

 

Different audience

 

“Bewitched”, “Brady Bunch”, “I Love Lucy”, and “Three’s Company” all had very successful runs in syndication. All four had daytime runs prior to entering syndication.

 

The only time that the first 3 seasons of Make Room For Daddy, with Jean Hagen and the original cast, was ever rerun was on NBC daytime in the early 60s. When the show finally ended its network run in 1964 and was put into syndication, only seasons 5-9 were put into the package. Until a couple of years ago when they were remastered for COZI (but unfortunately in 16x9 and cut by around 5 minutes), seasons 4, 10 and 11 had never reaired.

 

I like seeing or reading about the shows' new re-run titles (like "Andy of Mayberry"). Lassie was syndicated (I think- maybe also re-ran on a Network?) as both "Timmy and Lassie" and "Jeff's Collie".

 

Robert Young, Family Doctor (Marcus Welby MD)
The Raymond Burr Show (Ironside)
Badge 714 (Dragnet)
San Francisco Beat (The Lineup)
Sergeant Bilko (You'll Never Get Rich)
The Best of Groucho (You Bet Your Life)

 

I never understood the need to own series that would have been readily-available for viewing for an extended period of time, to the average audience. A movie or something for a rarified audience that isn't ubiquitous to the general public I can understand, such as Planet Of The Apes films, or other genre selections like James Bond, that you don't always see running over the course of a year.

The pride in owning a pristine copy of The andy Griffith Show for instance, would be undercut by the knowledge that even the casual viewer has had multiple opportunity to see their fill of the goings-on in Mayberry, and has little-to-no desire to re-live that hours wasted watching even the most iconic of sitcoms in a seemingly-endless daytime run.

 

Wagon Train - Major Adams, Trailmaster
Bonanza - Ponderosa

It was still being done as late as 1979:
Happy Days - Happy Days Again
Rockford Files - Jim Rockford, Private Investigator

I think it was MASH that ended the practice. It was syndicated under the same title even though the show was still in network first run.

 

The Bob Cummings Show became Love That Bob during its syndicated run.
Gunsmoke became Marshall Dillon

 

CHiPs Patrol (CHiPs)

McGarrett (CBS Late Night reruns of the 12th and final go [1979-80] of O-R Jack Lord Five-O)

 

I remember this one, as well as Laverne & Shirley reruns airing as Laverne & Shirley & Company.

 

Why is it hard to understand. In this day and age, who wants to have to watch a show with scenes cut out and chock full of commercial interruption? That was what we did 50 years ago, when we didn't have a choice.

 

I don't watch shows with commercial interruption; that's what the "skip" button is for. I don't watch shows with scenes cut out; either I see them the first time, or I never notice there may have been scenes cut out.

 

“Robert Young, Family Doctor” is one of the weirdest reruns titles I’ve seen. How was Young a doctor? This title only lasted for a season, when the show was running in syndication while the final season was seen on ABC. The next season, the reruns reverted to the original title.

 

It's always seemed a bit odd to me as well. They could have used something like Dr. Welby's Casebook to communicate the same idea.

 

So, if you read a book for the first time with 20% of the pages missing, you would be okay with it since you had never read those pages in the first place?

 

Would I be informed by the publisher that the pages are missing, or am I to not be aware of it, such as when I watch a syndicated show on television where there may not be anything to make you aware of it?

If I say "I never notice there may have been scenes cut out", that's exactly what I mean. But I am a great consumer of series television, and it really doesn't mean much to me if I miss the scene where Gilligan first runs into the coconut tree;
there's not a helluva lot of missed context if they still show the second time he runs into that same tree. Nope, not even if he exclaims, "Oww - again?!" Still no justification for buying the set for my shelf.