The crop of TV displays available in Sierra Leona does not meet current demand, at least for a portion of the market, according to TV center owners.
Going to TV viewing centers, as they are called in Sierra Leona, is a way of life for many football and film loving Sierra Leoneans. But the popularity of the centers, and the dimension of the TV screens that are available, puts constraints on people’s enjoyment.
“Some of the viewers always complain of straining their eyes while watching from smaller screens,” said Austin Wargbo, a viewing center operator Lumley, the western part of Freetown. “They have to stretch their necks or stand on their toes to get better views,” he said.
Long years of a lack of electricity in the city, combined with the high cost of buying generators and acquiring cable satellite dishes, gave rise to the number of TV viewing centers where European football matches and films from different parts of the world are shown on commercial basis
Having operated his center for a year, Wargbo’s main concern has always been to attract more customers. The center’s films and games are transmitted on television sets with the widest being 32 inches.
Wider, 64-inch screens and flat-panel displays from the Asian markets would serve all viewers better and even capture new ones, Wargbo said.
“That’s why we planned to be showing our games on projectors even though the quality of production is not as good as that of plasma TVs.” he said. “The last time a man brought a fairly used projector to us, which was sent to him from Europe, he was asking for $2,000. This is too expensive for us,” he said.
With two TV sets in his 8-meter-by-20-meter center with tarpaulin roofing, Wargbo said his audience usually varies between 50 and 100 viewers, depending on the importance of the match or film being played.
Even operators with more space have resorted to using two or three televisions to serve the viewers.
TV center operator Godswill Onyemechi uses 24-inch TVs for his center. He said he’d prefer a bigger size, up to 64 inches.
“I don’t really like using the projector. Cinemas use projector not TV centers like this,” he said pointing to his center, which he said can accommodate 60 viewers at its fullest.
Viewers pay between 800 leones (US$0.27) and 1, 500 leones to watch a game or film.
Onyemechi said big screen TVs are not available and the few ones around are too expensive.
A visit to one of the electrical shops in town reveals that a 32-inch LG flat-screen TV costs 4 million leones. That price would be hard to cover for startups. A salesperson says most consumer electronic dealers do not stock these widescreen TVs because it’s not a lucrative business.
