Shire debuts with 941,000 – second for the night in the 16-39 demo
Despite – or perhaps because of – attracting some of the most hostile social media reaction in the history of Australian television, Ten’s “dramality” series The Shire made a reasonable ratings debut of 941,000 last night.
After OzTam’s overnight metro ratings were corrected for the late start to the show, Ten says it was number one in its timeslot in the key advertising demographics of 16-39, 18-49 and 25-54. It was also second in 16-39 across the whole night. It peaked at 1.11m
The Shire – produced by Shine – trended on Twitter across Australia. Facebook was also dominated by conversations about the show featuring the lives of a small group of Sutherland Shire residents.
Source: Trendsmap
The show attracted controversy before it even went to air, with officials in Sutherland Shire opposing its production.
Speaking on Nova radio this morning, Ten’s chief programming officer David Mott said: “I think people are overthinking it. It’s a really guilty pleasure.”
Ten’s MasterChef won the night in all people on 1.355m with Seven’s Revenge second on 1.344m, followed by Nine News on 1.25m.
Nine’s struggling US version of The Voice took 592,000 and 21st across total viewers but bumped up in advertising demos, placing 11th in 16-39 and 12th in 18-49 and 25-54.
While The Shire won its timeslot battle in commercial TV, the ABC’s Australian Story rated fractionally better with 942,000.
In the battle of breakfast TV, Nine had a win with Today just beating out Seven’s Sunrise 318,000 to 316,000.
Seven won the night overall with a 22.6% channel share ahead of Nine’s 16.6%. Ten grabbed third on 16.4% ahead of the ABC on 15.1% and SBS’s 5.9%.
Monday’s Top 15 shows
1. Masterchef – Ten 1.355m
2. Revenge – Seven 1.344m
3. Nine News – Nine 1.250m
4. Seven News – Seven 1.224m
5. A Current Affair – Nine 1.062m
6. ABC News – ABC 1.043m
7. Today Tonight – Seven 1.032m
8. Home and Away – Seven 0.954m
9. Australian Story – ABC 0.942m
10. The Amazing Race – Seven 0.913m
11. The Shire – Ten 0.913m
12. 7:30 – ABC 0.852m
13. Four Corners – ABC 0.816m
14. Body of Proof – Seven 0.727m
15. Ten News – Ten 0.717m
Monday’s channel share
Seven: 22.6%
Nine: 16.6%
Ten: 16.4%
ABC1: 15.1%
SBS1: 5.9%
7TWO: 4.2%
GO!: 3.5%
Eleven: 3.0%
ABC2: 2.7%
Gem: 2.5%
One: 2.5%
7mate: 2.4%
ABC3: 1.1%
ABC News 24: 0.9%
SBS2: 0.6%
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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dear god that was the worse tv show I have ever seen. Horribly scripted with losers who want to be famous and can’t act.
Also wtf was up with the blonde’s dad? Looked more like an old ‘sugar daddy’ cracking onto her than her actual dad, so nasty
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I suggest someone ask David Mott if Ten will seek to claim The Shire as drama under ACMA’s rule for Australian drama content. Ten will argue because The Shire employs a team of writers who create scenarios for the participants to act out then this is drama. We will be sinking to a new low. Ten’s guilty pleasure will be cheap product.
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I loved it – thought it was very funny and extremely well produced.
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How did it go over the whole half hour? I guess I’m more interested in the figures after the rubber necks left. When was the peak? What was the average in the last segment? Those numbers will give a better indication of what it really did.
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Strangely enough the reality part of the show was better than the “professionaly scripted” part.
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It’s crap like the shire, that helps us craft our skills and talents to make great things.. it’s the law of averages.. you make enough crap, the good stuff will come out.. You can not expect to make masterpieces every time you put something out.. Look at America, for every 20 Jersey Shores, or 2 broke girls or the hills you get Breaking Bad or Veep, etc, etc.. Australia will never compete with the world in terms of TV, Film and music content because we are a bunch of haters..
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A very good result for a very funny show. Personally I loved it.
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Just when you thought nothing could beat Big Brother for soulless, abhorrent television full of wannabe stars, Ten go and create a new low in Australian TV viewing. Well done to all involved.
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What sort of idiot watches a show with the intention if hating it and them lets everyone know how much they hate it?
On another note the big brother promos are horrible and make little sense.
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It passed the first test… I switched it on, then watched the first 10 minutes before checking out emails on my iPad. Only gave short glances back to the TV show after that.
Production values were there. Plenty of nice scenery, sunshine and lovely looking beaches. Will give the real Shire a visit someday.
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Ok then (your BB note whats that got to do with anything) & Jezza , possible ch10 employees. Yep the produciton values are pretty good, it looks good. I see what there trying to do, a bit of the Hills a bit of Essex and a bit of Jersey/Geordie shores. But it just has some really aweful characters, Daddies little girl and the plastic twins terrible. And Daddy, creepy!! I watched the Hills and liked it, this is just a little sickening. Belongs on 11 . My ratings prediction pretty close, the social media stats must be off the richter it had more FB talkability than “The Voice”.
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What Simon said. A new low. It was terrific.
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With a population of approx 22 million in Australia. How many TV measurement box thingy’s are out there in the field calculating how many people are watching, which channel at a certain time?
Does the box calculate when people flick channels when adverts are on? Do they calculate when people are up making tea at commercials breaks or skipping to the bathroom too?
Seriously though, what proportion of our population have these measurement box thingy’s and how do they get to be picked to have them?
Finally, once everything is digital and with tv’s becoming vastly more technical, surely we will eventually be able to know what every tv in the land is watching and when?
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Okay, I have just researched this myself.
http://www.oztam.com.au/TheOzTAMPanel.aspx
Out of a population of 22million humans in Australia a grand total of 6500 approx households have OZTAM monitoring.
Do people think this is enough to truly grasp what the whole population is watching?
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OzTAM ratings are audience estimates based on actual viewing behaviour in 3,135 panel homes in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth and 1,413 homes nationally for subscription television.
OzTAM’s ratings service provider, Nielsen TAM, collects and produces ratings data on OzTAM’s behalf.
Households are recruited to OzTAM’s panel via a large-scale Establishment Survey that defines the population to be represented and its characteristics. In terms of panel size relative to the overall population, OzTAM’s panel is among the world’s largest.
OzTAM uses a sophisticated people metering system called Unitam which captures viewing to all broadcast television channels on all TV sets in panel homes.
http://www.oztam.com.au
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@Surin
The BB promos were on during the shire.
And thanks for your insights into ‘The Shire’. We haven’t heard them a million times already.
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No wonder 10’s share price is in the toilet, they’re running promos for channel 9 programmes. Someone call Lachlan!
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Hi Ok Then,
I’m pretty sure that you’re mistaken about the BB promos being on Ten.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella
Lu, those shows you mention are better than The Shore by a long mile. The reason Australian TV, film and music will never compete on the world stage is not because of some unfounded law of averages, it is because Australian continually produces low quality crap and hopes that something floats. Excuses are not enough, it shows the wrong shows are being funded, and the skill and talent simply aren’t there. You can’t blame the audience when a show like this receives a negative response, and cheer the production crew if it is a positive response. The audience now has a large and public voice, where it was once lucky to get a footnote. Audience want a professionally crafted product, not to sit around watching people craft their “skills and talents”, otherwise we would sit around watching people do theater sports, which this wasn’t far off.
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@mumbrella
They were on when I switched channels during the break.
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You really just have to come to the conclusion that talent is no longer an ingredient for being known..to quote the poet WH Auden
“Reason will be replaced by Revelation. Instead of Rational Law, objective truths perceptible to any who will undergo the necessary intellectual discipline, Knowledge will degenerate into a riot of subjective visions… Whole cosmogonies will be created out of some forgotten personal resentment, complete epics written in private languages, the daubs of schoolchildren ranked above the greatest masterpieces. Idealism will be replaced by Materialism. Life after death will be an eternal dinner party where all the guests are 20 years old… Justice will be replaced by Pity as the cardinal human virtue, and all fear of retribution will vanish… The New Aristocracy will consist exclusively of hermits, bums and permanent invalids. The Rough Diamond, the Consumptive Whore, the bandit who is good to his mother, the epileptic girl who has a way with animals will be the heroes and heroines of the New Age, when the general, the statesman, and the philosopher have become the butt of every farce and satire.”
In short..our culture is f@%ked!!!
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As questionable as this show is, the first night has got to be considered a success. Considering the targeted demographic can’t stop talking about it, they could be onto a winner.
Good production values and concept as well. It’s a show people will love to hate.
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Good comeback #Okay then, on fire.
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You really can’t take anything OzTAM says or does seriously. OzTAM is owned by the FTA stations and was set up because the previous holder of the TV ratings licence (Neilsen) insisted on taking ratings all year round and the TV bosses (and their employees) wanted their three month non-ratings silly season back so they could pack up, go to the beach and serve up rubbish to the viewers.
Having the TV stations do their own ratings is like having the Catholic church investigating pedophilia by priests.
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Well done to the people here leaving “very entertaining”, “very well produced” and other fake positive comments. We know you work at Shine… you’ve been busted on Facebook doing the exact same thing. Your profiles are public enough to see you work at Shine. Not very clever.
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No one should take ratings for the start of any season seriously. It’s the third episode which is the most important.
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I thought it was hilarious. Really enjoyed it. Not everything needs to be a serious drama or too cool HBO series. I agree its niche, and not for all demo’s, but I will be watching again next week.
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Vince..totally agree about the league of morons leaving positive post’s for this utterly stupid TV Show. How much of this mindless crap can we endure and what goes through the minds of people who produce it?
Not much..
@AD who’s talking about everything needing to be a HBO series, and when has something that is intelligent, considered and polished become “too cool”? I suggest we need a new TV Channel called “Moron”..you can tune in if you’d like to see how society is sliding into the cultural sewer.
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@ Jim
We already have three channels called ‘moron’ don’t we? (Not to mention their other channels on digital, such as oneHD, Mate and Gem etc…)
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@Jim it’s called MTV, and sadly I love it… I wish Shire was even close to being as good as Geordie or Jersey…
You’ve actually hit the nail on the head though, it’s a niche program that belongs on niche channel. Even the benchmark for this genre Jersey Shore in its breakthrough first season had less than 1% of Americans watching it, which is all you need when your population is that big. That happens to be 2.7mil (ave audience) of 31150000 Yanks. This programming has it’s place, usually subscription TV.
Ten is not a niche channel, yet…..
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+1 Jim
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Certainly thought it was rubbish, and I am directly in the middle of the “key demographic”. I can also say the large majority (read: almost all) of my fellow “key demographic” friends were equally as appalled.
The show was well publicised and talked about before it’s first episode, hence the large initial audience, however I think you’ll find week 2 will see a significant drop. The only people left watching this show will be ones to see ‘just how bad it gets’ and those who actually enjoy it. I hope that isn’t too many people, as I may have then lost faith in the Australian people…
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