Speaking at the Edinburgh Television Festival, Nigel Pickard, director of programmes for ITV, admitted that this summer has been tough with no major sporting event and too much dependence on old formats.
"We are seeing competitive times, this year in particular. This summer, the ratings were tough and it has been a very difficult environment. It's about the family portfolio of ITV channels now," he said.
Reality programmes such as 'Holiday Showdown', 'Ladette to Lady' and 'Lads' Army' have seen the channel accused of relying on celebrities and reality programmes to gain much-needed audience figures. Pickard hit back at these claims, saying that shows of this kind actually only made up 3.5% of ITV's output.
In the autumn, the channel will be launching at least 20 new drama series with more emphasis on programmes such as the offbeat romantic comedy 'Dirty Filthy Love', which did not rate well but "helped define what makes ITV".
"ITV has made a couple of mistakes and 'Celebrity Love Island' was a brave strategy, but we did what we wanted to do and that was we pushed 'Big Brother', which ended 13% down," Pickard said.
Pickard, who has been in his role since the end of 2002, agreed that there were two mistakes made with 'Celebrity Love Island'.
The first was that it was scheduled at the same time as Five's 'The Farm'; and secondly putting live streaming on at 11pm. The show has not yet been re-commissioned for a second year.
When asked what ITV hopes for the future, Pickard said: "ITV is about mixed events, drama and entertainment, shared viewing experiences and talked-about TV. We are still achieving the biggest peak-time across the channels."
ITV achieved huge success with the first series of 'X Factor', with 6.6m tuning into the start of the second series two weeks ago. The next series of 'I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here!' will launch in the autumn as more celebrities stick it out in the jungle for insect eating and grisly challenges.
Talking about his hopes for the future, Pickard said: "We realise that the commissioning team of nine people needs to be extended with at least two or three executive commissioners to keep up with the BBC, which has as many as 24."
If you have an opinion on this or any other issue raised on Brand Republic, join the debate in the .
.jpg)
.jpeg)
