‘Puppy Bowl' Viewership Down Slightly From Last Year

Super Bowl alternative programming set online traffic records for Animal Planet

By Tim Baysinger -- Broadcasting & Cable, 2/7/2012 7:46:56 PM

Animal Planet's Super Bowl alternative programming Puppy Bowl VIII, drew 8.7 million viewers across its 12-hour marathon, down 5% from last year's record-setting 9.2 million.

Puppy Bowl VIII did set an Animal Planet record in the online world, however, with 5.5 million page views and 1.4 million videos streamed on AnimalPlanet.com on Sunday. Puppy Bowl VIII ranked as the #1 social cable television show on Sunday, and was #2 overall behind Super Bowl XLVI, according to the network.

Meep the bird (@meepthebird), Animal Planet's tweeting correspondent, grabbed 21,000 followers in just one day and Twitter saw more than 200,000 Puppy Bowl-related tweets on game day. Making Twitter's top trending topics and trending worldwide throughout the day were #puppybowl, #animalplanet, #kittyhalftimeshow and #fumble (this year's Most Valuable Puppy--MVP).