UKTV’s Dave new world

“Everyone knows a bloke called Dave”, is the ethos guiding UKTV’s decision to rebrand its channel UKTV G2 as – honestly! – Dave. The press blurbage reads…

UKTV is strengthening its channel line up by evolving UKTV G2 into Dave, a comedy and factual entertainment channel. Launching on 15 October, the channel is aimed at a young male audience and will be available on all platforms including Freeview (DTT). The core aim of the name change is to create viewer affinity among a key target audience of ABC1 men aged 16-34 years.

And there’s more …

Dave Channel Head, Steven North explains, “With a schedule for which most broadcasters would give their eye teeth, UKTV G2 is an incredibly successful channel with 10 million viewers in pay homes each month, but with relatively low brand awareness. Changing the channel name to Dave enables us to create a strong and noisy personality for the channel that immediately aligns us with our core 16-34 male audience.”

Julia Jordan, UKTV’s Executive Director Business and Operations, added, “In a cluttered multi-channel environment channel branding is crucial, and Dave offers us a new and innovative way to create audience connections and a commercially desirable channel to maintain our viewing share.

The name change and move on to Freeview allows UKTV to further realise the potential of the channel proposition, making it available to view in 20 million homes nationwide for the first time. 

“There’s a definite opportunity for a channel like Dave on Freeview. The younger male audience is of very high value commercially and this demographic is currently under-served in Freeview homes,” added Julia.

Marketing activity to launch Dave will commence on 1 October with an on-air campaign created by Red Bee Media, which will play across the UKTV and Virgin Media networks. 

With a brief to establish Dave as the home of witty banter and as a refuge from the everyday, the award-winning Red Bee’s innovative and original creative juxtaposes traditional weekend retreat imagery with contemporary talent from the channel’s key content in a humorous and irreverent way to represent the channel’s key brand values.

So there it is. I’m sat here right now looking at the first of Dave’s promotional pictures: “Dave: the home of witty banter” superimposed over a panelled wood wall, with a giraffe edging in to shot.

Dave?!