Will The UK Go For Gold?
November 1st sees the launch of UK Gold the joint Thames and BBC archive entertainment channel broadcasting via the Astra satellite.
Equity disputes allowing (Newsline 26/10), the channel will broadcast 20 hours a day of drama, soaps and comedy repeats drawn from the libraries of the BBC and Thames TV. There will be no sports, news or current affairs programmes, simply what UK Gold calls ‘programming greats’ with a smattering of old films.
On the face of it the channel has a healthy pool of viewers available from day one, with anyone currently set up to receive BSkyB able to look at it free of charge for its first year of broadcast. However, only time will tell if the reaction of those 2.7 million cable and satellite households (Continental Research estimate) will be positive or whether the volume of repeats already shown on terrestrial television will dampen enthusiasm for yet more of the same, especially when it becomes a subscription only service in year two.
With revenue based solely on advertising until November 1993 a senior channel spokesman was unwilling to predict when UK Gold would move into profit, although a term of three years has been postulated. Likewise estimates of the market share the company is aiming for are being kept cautiously under wraps. Sky One’s audience share, with its general entertainment format would appear to be most at risk from the newcomer..
In the short term it does seem as though the opportunity to attract advertising against BBC programming for the first time has paid off; with commercial minutage fully booked for the remainder of the year. The first advertisers promise to be both new non-terrestrial and those already seen on mainstream ITV network, with an initial emphasis on the ‘Gold’ theme. Advertisements are sold in centre breaks of programmes at quarter to and quarter past the hour. The programmes being shown include Eastenders and Neighbours (both from the first episodes), drama series such as The Onedin Line and Shoestring and comedies including old favourites like George and Mildred and Father Dear Father. Most programmes achieved an initial audience of over 12 million. The schedule is ‘stripped’ so that advertisers and indeed viewers know roughly what time a soap, drama, comedy or film will be broadcast.
The target audience for the channel is ABC1 16-44 year old adults: UK Gold’s own research has apparently shown that popular quality repeats would attract a high percentage of cable and satellite homes falling into these categories and encourage terrestrial- only viewers to buy a dish.
UK Gold’s hope of expanding the market may be rather over-optimistic. Dish sales overall appear to have slowed according to figures by Continental Research dropping from 63,000 in August to 53,000 in September, compared to 65,000 in September 1991. A shortage in availability of dishes has been blamed but the long drawn out recession must certainly be a factor. It will be interesting to see whether UK Gold’s launch will boost these figures.
Overall, agencies have greeted UK Gold favourably. Commenting on the prospects for the channel,TV Buyer at Leo Burnett, Sarah Lynch summed up the mood; “UK Gold is a very favourable prospect and potentially a very viable and tempting alternative to Sky One; which has similar objectives in providing light entertainment”.
“Sky One, BSkyB’s largest generator of advertising revenue could be put under serious threat with the launch of UK Gold. An audience share in the longer term of 5% in satellite is achievable with quality BBC drama and comedy, and with only centre breaks, the outlook for advertisers in terms of programme environment is excellent”.
UK Gold will be on the BARB Astra Panel from day one, so it won’t be long before we can see the impact on the viewing shares of Sky One and other existing channels.