Trinity Broadcasting Network - Growth

Growth

TBN owns 35 full-power television stations serving larger metropolitan areas, and, at its peak, 252 low power television stations in the United States, which are mixed among stations serving medium-sized cities and rural translator stations in order to maximize the network's reach as much as is permissible. TBN also has several hundred affiliate stations throughout the United States, although just 61 of these stations are regular UHF or VHF stations. The rest are low-powered stations, requiring a viewer to be within several miles of the transmitter. According to TVNewsCheck, TBN currently is the third largest over-the-air television station group in the country, besting the station groups of CBS, FOX, and NBC, but behind Ion and Univision.

Worldwide, TBN's channels are broadcast on 70 satellites and over 18,000 TV and cable affiliates. TBN is also seen on the internet globally, where viewers can watch TBN programming live, as well as select archived shows on demand, through the website and select IPTV services. TBN also offers mobile apps in the iTunes Store and Google Play, which gives users access to TBN and its channels, plus the Arabic language Healing Channel, and Nejat TV in Persian.

During 2010, citing economic problems and a lack of donations, TBN closed down and sold many of its low-powered television repeaters. 17 of these were sold to the competing Daystar Television Network, while 151 of these will be donated to the Minority Media and Television Council (MMTC), an organisation designed to preserve equal opportunity and civil rights in the media; MMTC would later sell 78 of these translators to Luken Communications, parent company of the Retro Television Network. Four more translators in Dothan, Alabama; Kirksville, Missouri; Jonesboro, Arkansas; and Jackson, Tennessee were sold by MMTC to New Moon Communications, with the intent to convert them to NBC affiliates; however, as of September 2012, New Moon has placed all four of these translators on sale, leaving plans for local NBC affiliates in these communities in doubt. 44 of the licenses that were donated by TBN to the MMTC would later be cancelled on December 1, 2011 for remaining silent over a year. On April 13, 2012, TBN sold 36 of its translators to Regal Media, a broadcasting group headed by George Cooney, the CEO of the EUE/Screen Gems studios.

On October 22, 2012, it was announced that TBN has acquired Jackson, Mississippi CW affiliate WRBJ from Roberts Broadcasting. Once the sale is approved by the FCC, WRBJ will drop all secular and CW network program and become a full-time satellite of TBN. (The network was previously available in the Jackson area on WJKO-LP, which was later sold to the Daystar Television Network.)