The advertisement almost slipped by this weekend, a page 7 offering in that weekend advertorial wrap called The Extra. But there it was, the latest salvo in the war for your eyes and your clicker fingers.
Star Choice in a half page ad, urging Podunkians to break free from Cable Now! And with a 99 dollar gift certificate the folks from the satellite service offered up a tempting offer to those folks still attached to the Cable option. With a limited time offer, the folks at Star Choice are on a blitz to add to their base at the expense of the Citywest option.
With No money down and a number of incentives listed, such as 20 Pay Per View movies to new subscribers and free installation, the battle has begun anew. Citywest which purchased Monarch Cable a number of months ago, has not really offered much new on the television dial since the deal was closed and they entered the cable business. In fact they still insist on having subscribers contact Monarch's Medicine Hat offices for information and billing matters, so much for the local advantage!
Limited at the moment to a small offering of channels, one wonders if perhaps they may find that their subscriber base continues to shrink, while the Star Choice folks continue to plant their dishes on the roofs and decks of podunk at a rapid pace.
Take a drive around town and you'll find those grey Elliptical dishes pointing south on ever increasing homes. Each one most likely a lost customer, most likely never to return once they've discovered the wider selection of options offered by the dish. Features such as High Definition channels, far more sports programming than available locally, specialty channels that are only a rumor in Podunk and of course the Pay Per view system are all things that have already lured many a cable subscriber to the death star.
The entire Monarch purchase was done in a rather quiet way, not much was said during the negotiations and not much more has been said since Citywest took over the operation. Unless they hurry up their business plan and offer the same kind of increased programming in the movie, sport and specialty channel areas that Star Choice or Express Vu offers, they may find that there won't be many folks left to make the cable takeover worthwhile, let alone profitable .
If that happens, then there may be a lot of questions asked about the wisdom of taking on established competition, when it appeared that you didn't really want to compete after all.
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