UKTV Style

World Screen Weekly, May 31, 2007

COUNTRY: U.K.

LAUNCH DATE: November 2001

NUMBER OF SUBSCRIBERS: 10 million homes across the U.K. via Sky, Virgin TV and Top Up TV.

OWNERSHIP: UKTV, a joint venture between BBC Worldwide and Virgin Media Television.

DESCRIPTION: UKTV Style is a British lifestyle channel targeted at young women aged 16 to 44. The programming is centered on three key areas: home, fashion and wellbeing. The channel’s schedule includes a number of BBC titles as well as original commissions.

CEO, UKTV: David Abraham

DIRECTOR OF LIFESTYLE: Jane Mote

ACTING HEAD OF COMMISSIONING: Diana Howie

HEAD OF ACQUISITIONS: Sarah Wright

CHANNEL HEAD, UKTV STYLE: Catherine Catton

PROGRAMMING STRATEGY: “Home” programming is at the core of UKTV Style’s schedule. “We do everything from interior design and property to buying abroad [and] buying a holiday fantasy home,” says Catherine Catton, the channel head. In April, UKTV Style launched a campaign that touted it as “being the home of home.”

The network’s prime-time schedule from Monday through Friday is focused on residences, particularly “big, high-end, glossy homes,” says Catton. In prime time, the channel’s popular programs include a mixture of major acquisitions such as the hit renovation series Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, which is currently in its fourth season, and commissions like Fantasy Homes by the Sea, which follows presenter Catherine Gee as she helps ten couples find their dream property by the coast. Other top-performing series include the BBC acquisition DIY SOS, which tries to remedy some of the worst do-it-yourself home disasters.

The channel commissions around 80 hours of programming a year, and the rest of the network’s schedule is comprised of acquisitions from the BBC or third-party programming. While the majority of UKTV Style’s audience—65 percent—is female, that will vary depending on the type of programming. “The property [programs] clearly tend to skew toward 30 and upwards,” says Catton. “Our fashion and well-being [programming] tend to skew younger and be a bit more female, so they balance each other.”

The daytime schedule skews slightly older, says Catton, and highlights “more gentle BBC properties” such as the antique-centered game show Bargain Hunt. In the morning, from 10 a.m. to noon, the network also airs a “Style Life” strand that features parenting shows such as Little Angels and The House of Tiny Tearaways. Other popular titles include the fashion-focused The Clothes Show, which was a signature BBC title in the ’80s and early ’90s. UKTV Style brought back The Clothes Show after a 20-year hiatus, and reformatted the series for premiere on the network in October 2006. The second season is currently on the network, with a third season to follow this fall. In the area of wellbeing, the detox series Spa of Embarrassing Illnesses, about a group of people who check into a spa in an attempt to rid themselves of socially embarrassing body conditions, has also done well for the channel.

On the weekends, shows like DIY SOS and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition will air during the day, while evenings are focused more on entertainment and are skewed toward a younger audience. Sunday evenings are centered on fashion, and include The Clothes Show at 6 p.m.

“From our programming to our marketing, to the way that our channel is put together and the way that we communicate the channel, it’s got really strong, emotional intelligence shot all the way through,” explains Catton. “We really understand our audience, we know what it’s like to be our audience. As a team, we get what women think about, worry about, and are interested in—and we discuss that with them.”

WHAT’S NEW: This summer, the network will also roll out a number of wedding-themed series and specials, including First Dance, which had originally been commissioned by ITV but remained unscheduled until the production company Isis Media bought it back from the terrestrial broadcaster. Catton and UKTV’s acting head of acquisitions, Penny Harris, acquired the series through TVF International, and it was re-versioned to 15×23-minute episodes exclusively for UKTV Style. The series follows 15 couples as they learn how to perform a specially choreographed dance routine to a song that has special meaning to them. “In the U.K. dance programming seems to be one of the big genres at the moment, with shows like Strictly Come Dancing and Dancing on Ice,” notes Catton.

UKTV Style also commissioned Ricochet to produce a new series called Colin and Justin’s Home Show, which is scheduled for a September premiere as part of the channel’s “home” strand. Fronted by the celebrity design presenters Colin McAllister and Justin Ryan, the series clues viewers into the latest interior design trends.

WEBSITE: uktvstyle.co.uk

—By Irene Lew