ITV crisis as channel takes extreme measures after ratings slump on daytime TV shows including GMB & This Morning
STAFF on shows headed by stars Susanna Reid, Cat Deeley and Ben Shephard are facing a pay freeze as daytime telly suffers a big slump in viewers.
Production teams have also been warned there could be job losses and three-month contracts instead of long-term roles.
The number of freelance staff is being cut too.
And even an annual summer party — which attracts the likes of presenters Kate Garraway and Richard Arnold — is on ice.
ITV daytime chief Emma Gormley called a series of crisis “Town Hall” meetings last week to break the news affecting four of its struggling flagship shows — Good Morning Britain, This Morning, Lorraine and Loose Women.
She showed staff a graph detailing the rapid decline in ratings, while highlighting the booming viewing figures for streaming platforms Netflix and Amazon Prime.
She named Netflix’s Baby Reindeer, which had 60million views in a month, Amazon’s The Grand Tour, seen more than 170million times worldwide and Clarkson’s Farm, which had almost 11million views in its first weekend.
A source said: “ITV is really tightening their belt. There have been concerns for months at the top but now that it’s trickled down to the shop floor it feels very depressing.
“A lot of staff are being put on three-month contracts, probably so they can get rid of people easily. There are pay freezes in place.
“On screen they are keeping costs down by not trialling new talent on regular segments.
“There is hope that the viewing figures pick up again as the UK election campaigns kick in again.
“But it feels particularly difficult to stomach after they splashed out on the re-launch of This Morning.”
It was reported in March that This Morning’s planned saviours Cat and Ben had bagged £555,000 following Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby’s departures last year.
But in their first month, ratings fell from more than a million to 692,500.
After two months they were as low as 635,000.
And by April 30, the average number of people watching live was 544,000.
Saturated market
Last year Susanna was said to have a £1million contract to front GMB, making her one of the best paid presenters on TV.
It makes Holly’s decision to quit This Morning for new ventures such as Netflix’s Bear Hunt seem a shrewd one.
Cost-cutting timescales were not revealed, but stars like Susanna, Cat and Ben are likely to be affected when the time comes to negotiate new contracts with them.
Expert Tom Harrington, head of TV at Enders Analysis, thinks the cause of the mainstream daytime slump is that the market is saturated.
He said: “The main thing is the growth in options of where to get content from, meaning that viewing fragments. This is coupled with there being a lot more screens so that you don’t have to always watch the same thing as the dominant person in the house, which was the case when most homes had just a single TV set.
“The amount of video that people are watching hasn’t changed much over the last few years. But where and how they are watching has seen dramatic shifts. Whereas ten years ago the average person watched around three hours and 40 minutes from the broadcasters daily, that is now just over 2½ hours.
“This viewing has been replaced by programmes from streaming services like Netflix and Disney+ but also shorter videos from YouTube.
“ITV is still bigger in the UK than Netflix, Disney+ and Prime Video combined. But, like other broadcasters, its viewing is declining, with the average person now watching around 34 minutes from them each day — down from over 50 a decade ago. That being said, ITV still releases enormous shows. According to ratings agency Barb, each episode of Mr Bates vs The Post Office has been watched by over 14 million people.
“Meanwhile, BBC1’s Morning Live has gone from strength to strength, getting a peak this year of 1.6million — partly because it does not repeat the traditional format.
“It is almost entirely consumer and lifestyle-focused, which is why Beeb bosses claim they do not even see This Morning as a rival.”
Last month, the Beeb’s daytime TV boss Rob Unsworth told Broadcast magazine: “Shows that feel like traditional daytime no longer have a place in our schedule. We have a linear audience but those programmes are good enough to appeal to people at any time of day on all platforms.
“These days, all content needs a second life, even if it is repackaged in bite-size chunks on social media.”
Last night ITV said: “Town hall meetings happen frequently for teams to keep up to date, and have a chance to have questions answered.
“The latest celebrated the success of Lorraine Kelly receiving a Bafta Special Recognition Award and the two Bafta nominations for Daytime. It was also a transparent portrayal of what is happening across the industry.”