Breakfast Television

Breakfast television is a type of television programme broadcast live in the morning (typically between 6:00am and 9:00am), with the express purpose of being watched by people getting ready to go to work.

[Top]

Format and style

Primarily breakfast television prepares people for the day ahead and thus normally features regular (every half hour or so) news, weather and travel reports. The time in between is filled with more depth on major news stories, features, reviews of the days papers and often business news, such as information about the stock market.

Despite these programmes often being produced by news organisations, their style is much more laid back. Traditionally they are fronted by two presenters (one male, one female) on a sofa surrounded by a warmly coloured (but not overwhelming) set.

[Top]

History

The world's first breakfast television programme was The Today Show on the US channel NBC which began broadcasting on January 14 1952. Many other channels all around the world followed NBC's lead.

In the UK, ITV (now ITV1) considered breakfast television so important that it created an entire franchise for it (to go with the regional franchises that broadcast for the rest of the day). This franchise was awarded to TV-am. However, delays to TV-am's launch meant that the BBC were able to to launch their own programme, Breakfast Time on January 17 1983. TV-am, with Daybreak and Good Morning Britain being its flagship programmes, launched just two weeks later on February 1 1983. TV-am found it hard to survive at first, due to it being reliant on advertising income from a timeslot where people were not accustomed to watching TV. However, it eventually flurished, only to lose its lincence from 1993 onwards to GMTV who outbid them.

Today, breakfast television is an established part of many people's lives and a popular way to start the day.

[Top]