ITV2 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned by ITV plc. It was launched on 7 December 1998. For a number of years, it had the largest audience share after the five analogue terrestrial stations, a claim now held by its sister service ITV3 both of which are freely available to a majority of households.
The channel is primarily aimed at the 16–34 age group, similar to BBC Three and E4, and is known for American programming such as adult animations Family Guy, American Dad! and Bob's Burgers; repeats of recently aired episodes of soap operas and other entertainment programming from ITV such as Coronation Street, Emmerdale and Catchphrase; original comedy such as Celebrity Juice and Plebs; and reality formats such as Big Brother and Love Island.
Broadcasting Satellite Freesat UK: Channel 113 (HD) & Channel 114 (+1) Sky UK: Channel 118 (HD) & Channel 218 (+1)
Terrestrial Freeview UK: Channel 6 (SD) & Channel 29 (+1)
Cable Virgin Media: Channel 115 (HD), Channel 315 (+1)
IPTV Freely: Channel 6 (HD)
History Prior to the launch of Channel 4 in 1982, the name "ITV2" had sometimes been used to refer informally to an envisioned second commercial network in the UK. However, the name resurfaced in the late 1990s for very different reasons. The launch of digital terrestrial television services in the UK saw each existing analogue terrestrial broadcaster given a slice of bandwidth with which to carry their existing service after the analogue switch off, with space left over for new channels. While strictly speaking this space belonged to each regional contractor for use within their own region, ITV had undergone a series of buyouts earlier in the decade; the three players operating the majority of the network, Granada, Carlton, and United News & Media, jointly launched ITV2 in 1998 to be broadcast to most of the country as a uniform service. While free-to-air, it was marketed alongside their own subscription based ONdigital platform. Other ITV licencees, SMG, UTV and GMTV launched their own services in the space (see below).
Ahead of a proposed white paper for digital broadcasting in the summer of 1995, ITV already had interest in launching ITV2, which would broadcast in widescreen.CULF, A. (1995, May 02). Bruce Gyngell returns to head Yorkshire-Tyne Tees Television. The Guardian One of the likely possibilities for the new channel was the airing of repeats of programmes from the main ITV channel or sporting events.Rufus Olins and, M. L. (1995, Aug 13). Opening TV's floodgates;Digital Television. The Times The new channel would be a concerted group effort between the various ITV franchise owners, as they would have shares in the channel.Lynn, M. (1995, Oct 15). Satellite and cable move by Granada. The Times Moreover, it would be a centralised channel from the outset, without relying on the federal structure of the existing channel.Mathew Horsman, M. E. (1996, May 10). ITV companies agree to launch joint digital services. The Independent
ITV2 was announced in May 1998, and the channel's original controller was . Most of the programmes were repeats, but these would enable viewers to catch up with recent ITV programmes. Airing of retro output was ruled out, because it did not have the intention of becoming another archive channel. Among the ideas for original programmes included a daily teenage talk show set to air on weekdays, a late night half-hour review of the week's ITV soaps, a pop music review show to air during peak time, an interactive sports magazine programme and a football-themed game show. There would also be coverage of alternative sports, such as golf, basketball and snow boarding. Within days of the announcement, independent production company Chrysalis hoped to provide programmes for the channel.Newman, C. (1998, May 16). Chrysalis hopes future is black. Financial Times Snooker coverage was announced in June, with two new tournaments being created specifically for the new channel.Henderson, J. (1998, Jun 28). New channel is the cue for yet more snooker BEHIND THE SCREEN. The Observer At the time, the channel had an awareness rate of just 5%.Digital TV will be slow to take off. (1998, Jun 25). Marketing, 8. The channel was initially due to launch in November, but it had already faced a potential problem based on low ratings, based on the possibility of airing Manchester United and Arsenal matches for the upcoming Champions League season, but would see a decrease when the group phase was expected to end in December.Henderson, J. (1998, Jul 19). BEHIND THE SCREEN: ITV spoilt for choice - it's the reds or the reds. The Observer
In July, Julia Lamaison was appointed its director of broadcasting, as part of its two-channel strategy for digital broadcasting. The original plan of making it a youth-centric channel was superseded by a broader, mixed-genre and mixed-demographic format, countering the plan to downsize ITV1's age to be closer to ITV2's. It had an 80-hour a week schedule, running 4pm-2am on weekdays and 9:30am-2:30am on weekends. Programming was balanced between 50% catch-up material (repeats, also labelled as "the nation's VCR"), original programming which would take up a quarter or a third of the total offer, and the rest being imports. The channel had a launch budget of £221 million, little more than double of Channel 5 in its launch the previous year, which was £110 million. Discussion on advertising minutage were underway, being managed by a three-way advertising house managed by Carlton, Granada and UNM. Advertisers that were not on the main ITV channel were keen on appearing on ITV2.Shelton, E. (1998, Jul 30). ITV2 adopts the family look. Marketing, 11. It was also confirmed that ITV2 would become a priority for analogue cable services, which were already at full capacity.Davies, P. (1998). Cable set for channel shake-out. New Media Markets, 16(28), 1-1,8+. An agreement to carry the channel on Cable & Wireless Communications' analogue cable service was signed in November, coinciding with the launch of the first digital transmitters in England and Wales.CWC agrees deal with ITV to broadcast ITV2 channel. (1998, Nov 03). AFX News The channel was also part of a low-cost package unveiled in early October.CWC INTRODUCES LOW COST TV AND TELEPHONY. (1998). Cable Europe, 8(20), 1. The channel was expected to cover 500,000 households with digital television by year-end 1999.Grande, C. (1998). ITV2 targets 500,000 digital TV homes. New Media Markets, 16(40), 4-5. Advertising adopted a flexible strategy, sold on a fixed-price basis.Beale, C. (1998). ITV2 promises flexible airtime sales strategy. Campaign, 4.
ITV2 launched at 7:00pm on 7 December 1998. The first programme was an hour-long introductory programme called It Takes Two, presented by and . Billie Piper was heavily involved in the channel's promotion at launch, with an updated version of the 1966 song It Takes Two sung by her used as the theme song for the launch programme and featured in the original promos for the channel. The programme featured messages from Michael Barrymore, Trevor McDonald, Boyzone's Ronan Keating, Jerry Springer and Samantha Janus.ITV2 launched with a bang (1998, Dec 07). Evening Mail A highlight of opening night was Trevor McDonald's interview to Fergie, which was plagued with concerns of possible low ratings before it even aired. Estimated statistics revealed that the channel had limited terrestrial coverage, as well as a potential audience of 850,000 cable subscribers.Lisa O'Carroll, M. C. (1998, Dec 07). Trev's fergie chat is a flop. The Mirror
While ITV2 is now an entertainment channel aimed to a younger audience; at its launch in 1998, it was a mixed genre channel and featured some programmes aimed at much older audiences than what the channel broadcasts currently. Despite this, the channel was launched to target a younger, more male audience. Such original programmes were mostly produdced on a low budget, including a late night music programme aimed at teenagers, Bed Rock, plus studio-based game shows.Paul McCann, M. E. (1998, Dec 08). New ITV channel targets the young. The Independent
Much of the original content in its launch schedule was current affairs related programming fronted by ITV newscasters. Katie Derham presented a weekly media analysis programme called Wide Angle, John Suchet fronted a weekly current affairs discussion programme called Who, What, Why, and Trevor McDonald presented an interview series, Trevor McDonald Meets.... These three programmes all ran on Sunday nights.
There were repeats of popular ITV programmes including Midsomer Murders, Inspector Morse, A Touch of Frost, Heartbeat, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, Gladiators, CD:UK, Don't Try This at Home, Trisha, This Morning, Loose Women and My Wonderful Life, American acquisitions such as Judge Judy, The Jerry Springer Show, The Late Show with David Letterman and Maggie Winters, omnibus editions of ITV soaps Emmerdale, Coronation Street, The Bill and Home and Away, and a Saturday football results service called Football First, which was promoted to ITV1 in 2001 (while maintaining an ITV2 slot) and rebranded as The Goal Rush. Other launch programmes included youth magazine show Bedrock and Soap Fever which taken a look at the UK's major television soap operas. There was also live coverage of the UEFA Champions League among a range of other sports coverage. Many of the older-skewing drama series were dropped after the launch of ITV3 in 2004, and the launch of ITV4 the year later saw ITV2 ditch sports coverage, except on certain occasions as overspill.ITV's extended digital family. (2005, 09). Marketing, Suppl.50 YEARS OF FAME, 13-16.
The channel underwent a mass repositioning as a general entertainment channel, starting a £500,000 campaign to increase awareness, fronted by Jerry Springer. This was due to mixed messages regarding the channel's format, which has changed since launch. Commercial director Andrew Chowns denied that this had to do with Channel 4's plan to launch E4, and that this would entice viewers to "stay" with the ITV family of channels.Brech, P. (2000, Jul 13). ITV2 hires springer for viewer reposition. Marketing, 10. A website was also launched, in order to increase its takeup among web users.ITV2 ready to go live with site for young web users. (2000, Jul 13). Marketing, 11.
In June 2004, ITV plc announced that they were going to double the channel's programme budget and would add more American series and movies. On 1 November 2004, in an attempt to launch ITV3 on Sky, ITV2 moved from 175 to 118 on Sky after ITV plc bought GSkyB for £10million. As a result, Plus was permanently closed down, with its EPG slot taken by ITV3.
On 10 October 2006, ITV announced the launch of a one-hour timeshift service of ITV2, ITV2+1. The channel launched on 30 October 2006 along with ITV3 +1.
In November 2006, ITV2 commissioned its first soap opera, Echo Beach. The series was to be interlinked with ITV1's comedy-drama Moving Wallpaper. In the end however, Echo Beach was broadcast on ITV1 instead of ITV2 as was originally planned.
ITV2 and its one-hour timeshift channel began broadcasting 24 hours a day on . The hours formerly held by GMTV2 were moved to ITV4. GMTV2 programming moved from ITV2 to ITV4. On 20 August 2008, ITV2 unveiled a new look. The logo was given a 3D look, with six new idents. The new look co-incided with a line-up of new programmes including Celebrity Juice, CelebAir, The Fashion Show and No Heroics.