Lifestyle boss Hannah Barnes to leave Foxtel
The group general manager of Foxtel’s Lifestyle channels, Hannah Barnes, will be leaving the company in October.
Barnes joined the Foxtel Lifestyle group as head of programming in 2009 and took responsibility for the channels in 2015.
“Hannah has made an indelible mark on the success of the genre over the course of her stewardship and the Lifestyle group is the envy of our competitors,” said Foxtel’s head of Television, Brian Walsh.
“Her craftsmanship is admired throughout our industry, both here in Australia and internationally.”
“Hannah can count an impressive number of local commissions to her resume, including Grand Designs Australia, Selling Houses, River Cottage, Village Vets, Great Australian Bake Off and Gogglebox to name a few.
“Last year she championed the commissioning of Love It Or List It which premiered as the highest rating Lifestyle production in Foxtel’s history.
Mumbrella has contacted Foxtel about who will replace Barnes.
Barnes sent out the following note to Foxtel’s staff yesterday:
Dear all,
I wanted to let you all know that I have made the decision to move on from my current role as Group General Manager of Lifestyle at Foxtel. I will be leaving at the end of October.
This has not been an easy decision for me because I have loved every minute of my nine years here. I have worked with the most fabulous people, both off screen and on screen. I am proud of many things that I have achieved but our world class local productions are the thing that really standout. Our numbers for Gogglebox last night just prove how much Australians love our shows.
I want to thank everyone at Foxtel there are so many wonderful people working in this company. In particular Brian Walsh who has been an amazingly supportive leader and influence on me. I would like to thank Steve Baldwin for his guidance, calmness and candour.
The team at Lifestyle are the best in the business. Your passion, hard work, and brilliance is the reason Lifestyle is what it is today. I really love you guys and will miss you enormously!
It has been an amazing honour to be the brand guardian of Lifestyle, such an iconic Australian brand. Whenever I mention to a taxi driver I work for Lifestyle, they always tell me they like it and they know it and how much they love our shows.
I am ready to embark on my next adventure and to start the next chapter of what has been an incredible career both in the UK and now back in Australia.
It’s time for me to “see what’s possible”
Thanks
Hannah
Maybe moving around the corner to Pyrmont? Ten could use her
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Is it any suprise we keep getting farewell emails like these? Deanne Weir / Mark Buckman PT (Peter Tongah) etc etc. Hannah had to deal with the shrinking budgets but rising costs, getting shrinking advertising revenue by getting products in return for advertising squeezes and of course dropping chanels from the lineup. Its not easy to pop in to work knowing you have to start letting good staff go because those above have no idea that Foxtel is no longer the monopoly we once were, no one takes notice of our Customer feedback Net promoter scores or care what our customers say in Retention calls. Project Martian 1 (Martian 2) not looking like Customer Hero’s anymore
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It amazes me how the comms coming out of Foxtel don’t reconcile with customer feedback and customer churn. Andy Lark’s PR rubbish about the brand and commercial focus doesn’t look promising if the business lacks customers to deliver revenue and growth.
Foxtel has become an expensive tv indulgence filled with bloated advertising content.
You are now paying for packages which subsidize crap channels outside of sport while being bombarded with ads.
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