Countdown at Teatime

[Marc Meakin]

I'm probably raking over old coals here but isnt it time Countdown was moved to a teatime slot of 4 O 'clock or later
I mean now that a teatime quiz show stalwart is taking over and hopefully a better quality guest in dictionary corner and I'm sure ratings will go up

[James Robinson]

I'm probably raking over old coals here but isnt it time Countdown was moved to a teatime slot of 4 O 'clock or later
I mean now that a teatime quiz show stalwart is taking over and hopefully a better quality guest in dictionary corner and I'm sure ratings will go up

Why would moving it to 4pm give us a better quality guest...?? Surely that all depends on when people are available to do the recording dates...???

And arguably, the times of shows now are almost irrelevant in these sorts of on demand ages...

[Philip A]

I disagree the time slot doesn’t matter. This article from 2020 is good: http://www.ukgameshows.com/ukgs/Weaver% ... 2020-05-17

[Marc Meakin]

I'm probably raking over old coals here but isnt it time Countdown was moved to a teatime slot of 4 O 'clock or later
I mean now that a teatime quiz show stalwart is taking over and hopefully a better quality guest in dictionary corner and I'm sure ratings will go up

Why would moving it to 4pm give us a better quality guest...?? Surely that all depends on when people are available to do the recording dates...???

And arguably, the times of shows now are almost irrelevant in these sorts of on demand ages...

It wont give you better guests but a teatime audience would encourage guests to be interested as a teatime audience would be a wider one but as I understand it Anne Robinson has slightly more pulling power than Nick Hewer who couldnt even get Lord Sugar on the show

[Rhys Benjamin]

The timeslot is important. You have to build up a new viewer base and your best option is to capture viewers "accidentally" - that's why programs that get broadcast at 9pm get huge figures, even for things with zero brand loyalty.

I may be retelling a story from my mother but if Countdown was not on at 4:30 I would never have got into it as a baby. If it was on at 2:10 as it is now, I would never have watched it at school. 3:30 was OK-ish because school finished at 3:20 and with a pathetically small catchment area everyone would race home to watch it. Conor Travers's exploits became the main topic of conversation in the school playground when I was 7...! The teacher I had then, a lovely woman by the name of Margaret Pittaway, would in turn get invested in what we were watching as kids, and apparently at "home time" she told my mother it was noticeable the mood was much lower than usual following Richard Whiteley's death!

There is, of course, a serious point here, which is that would never happen nowadays. Linear television still accounts for the vast majority of viewers, Countdown was "event television" in the past, just as WWTBAM or Beat The Chasers is now, and at its current timeslot it will not ever get back to those levels, which I fully believe IS possible - as seen by the fact Catsdown outperforms Cats in the ratings considerably.

[Gavin Chipper]

I'm probably raking over old coals here but isnt it time Countdown was moved to a teatime slot of 4 O 'clock or later
I mean now that a teatime quiz show stalwart is taking over and hopefully a better quality guest in dictionary corner and I'm sure ratings will go up

Why would moving it to 4pm give us a better quality guest...?? Surely that all depends on when people are available to do the recording dates...???

And arguably, the times of shows now are almost irrelevant in these sorts of on demand ages...

It wont give you better guests but a teatime audience would encourage guests to be interested as a teatime audience would be a wider one but as I understand it Anne Robinson has slightly more pulling power than Nick Hewer who couldnt even get Lord Sugar on the show

Encouraging guests gives you a wider pool of guests to pick from so potentially better guests. Having said that, higher profile (more famous) guests won't necessarily be any better than more obscure ones. Being famous doesn't make you interesting.

There is, of course, a serious point here, which is that would never happen nowadays. Linear television still accounts for the vast majority of viewers, Countdown was "event television" in the past, just as WWTBAM or Beat The Chasers is now, and at its current timeslot it will not ever get back to those levels, which I fully believe IS possible - as seen by the fact Catsdown outperforms Cats in the ratings considerably.

What do you mean by "event television" exactly? When Millionaire was newish, it was quite a big deal and you could talk to people about the latest instalment. I don't think that's the case now or that it's ever been the case for Beat The Chasers.

Normal 8 out of 10 Cats isn't really a thing now. It got demoted to E4 (or some random Channel 4-based channel) and hasn't been watched by anyone since. Is it still on?

[James Laverty]

I'd hardly call Millionaire or Beat the Chasers "event television". They perform well, have loyal fanbases and fans will talk about them, but it's not event television.

"Event Television" though, can be used for Line of Duty. In a supposed era where linear TV ratings no longer matter, it's has been smashing recent records with the overnight figures, and will probably do the same when the 28day ratings are out. It has proved there is still an audience for such shows in the era of streaming, and the BBC's decision not to put the whole series on iPlayer before airing on BBC One, like it has with some other shows (eg Killing Eve) has paid off.

[Philip A]

Millionaire and Beat the Chasers are definitely event television in their own right, especially if they air in consecutive nights.

The first 7 series of Millionaire from 1998 to 2000 ran for 7 to 12 consecutive nights, roughly once every four months or so. That was when it was at its height; up to 19.7 million viewers watched in anticipation to see who would become the first jackpot winner. It was when they began airing it in Mondays, Tuesdays and Fridays for approximately 30 weeks of the next two years when interest faded. It then rot away more after becoming just a Saturday night show for its last ten years. Most series of the current version with Jeremy Clarkson aired 5-7 nights per week and they work much better.

For gameshows, specifically, they’re event television if they’re once-in-a-while events that air in consecutive nights. They work well for Beat the Chasers and, more recently, The Cube (with pairs of contestants playing).