Viewers have been deserting the breakfast programme since it took over from GMTV in September. This week saw Daybreak drop to 545,000 viewers, some 860,000 viewers behind their BBC rivals. It seems that the costly duo, Adrian Chiles and Christine Bleakley have failed to attract breakfast viewers to ITV.
Back in the early 80's TV-AM was launched to rival BBC Breakfast, yet very early on ITV was being trouted in the rating war. Then bosses brought in Roland Rat (pictured above) with his side-kick Kevin the Gerbil. Within weeks, TV-AM had become the breakfast darling and quickly became the top breakfast programme.
ITV needs to bring in somebody or some animal in order to perk up the viewers, Adrian and Christine have the right chemistry but the programme needs something more. TV-AM is a classic example of how to turn a breakfast programme around - so bring out Roland Rat or Zig and Zag to liven up the show.
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Since TV-AM there hasn't really been any common sense when it comes to early morning TV shows on either ITV or BBC.
ReplyDeleteChannel 4 managed to make a go at it with The Big Breakfast and like TV-AM that worked, and then Radio 1 became really popular as a early morning show with Chris Moyles
But why did it work really well? Breakfast TV bosses need to look at the format of those shows and understand why sitting two chat show hosts on a settee from 6-9am isn't going to win them any ratings.
The chat show/news format is for adults. The majority of adults however at those times in the morning aren't the ones to be watching the show. They are too busy getting ready for work to be bothered about sitting there watching someone droll on TV, they want something that will keep the KIDS entertained before school, so they can get ready for work.
This is why TV-AM worked, it had lots of little bits for kids as well as some of the adult stuff thrown in as well - Roland Rat, Wacaday, Timmy Mallett, etc. The Big Breakfast did the same lots of things going on, very fresh, Zig and Zag keeping the kids entertained whilst adults are getting ready, and Chris Moyles - ok not exactly TV as it's radio - but then again lots of good sections again keeping kids entertained - the Chris Moyles parodies, car park catchphrase, etc..
For breakfast TV to work they need something that does show the news headlines every so often but in a fun and fast format - like the BBC do with Radio 1 newsbeat, and then go back to children's entertainment so they don't lose too much attention for the kids.
Ant and Dec would probably make a superb pair on early morning TV or Dick and Dom
I agree 100% with those words. Now we just need the programme producers to read this!
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