CHECKOUT CHANNEL CHECKS OUT

The Checkout Channel, one of the more promising ventures from Atlanta-based Turner Broadcasting’s stable of out-of-home media projects, is getting the plug pulled after slightly more than a year. Turner is taking a $16-million writeoff on the venture. The Checkout Channel was succeeding, but not as well or as fast as necessary. Officials with Turner last week said they were discontinuing expansion plans for the customized news/informational service broadcast in supermarkets across the country. Within the next eight weeks Turner will give stores the option of dumping the equipment or keeping the monitors at checkout lines and getting the Headline News feed from Cable News Network.