Am I right in thinking the weather was the first sponsored "programme" on UK television?
Yes, although it wasn't sponsored at the start - the book Independent Television in Britain points out the weather began in February 1989 and was first sponsored in September. At that point it was only a mention on screen at the end of the forecast rather than a proper ident, much like how the 1990 World Cup was sponsored by National Power but there weren't break bumpers, it appeared on in-programme graphics and the presenters and commentators read it out ("This night of disappointment for Scotland has been brought to you by National Power!").
The book suggests that initially sponsorship was limited to certain types of programme, and the sponsorship we're used to now began in January 1991. I know the first scripted programme that was sponsored was Rumpole of the Bailey. The book also talks about the 1991 Rugby World Cup and how that was sponsored, in that ITV were obliged to offer first refusal to the official tournament sponsors, but none of them were interested so they were open to offers, and eventually Sony signed up. And then after the tournament they did some audience research and when they asked how many of the tournament's sponsors they remembered, Sony came first by several million miles, despite not actually being an official sponsor.
They were never quite as good once HSBC bought them out. Did like the ITV Drama Premiere and ITV Movie Premiere stings in the hearts era though.
The ITV Drama Premiere with Midland Bank seemed really exciting in those days, they really felt like proper big events and I think they became a properly well-known brand that audiences would look out for. The attraction rather palled when they did a load of rubbish dramas to make use of actors on golden handcuffs deals, mind. For a while there was also the ITV Comedy Premiere with Cockburns Port, as they sponsored all of ITV's comedy for a while, including the Comedy Awards and things like Cold Feet. That was less successful, not least because of the dreadful break bumpers with some Marquess of Bath-style arisrocrat causing chaos in a stately home, the least appopriate juxtaposition with Cold Feet imaginable.
Of course, for a while Becks sponsored all drama on C4 but pulled out when they decided Queer as Folk was a bit too rude for them. But it was interesting that in that instance Becks got all the bad PR for coming across as narrow-minded rather than C4.
The "Changing Rooms" effect at the time had created a glut of interior decorating programmes. It almost seemed as if every sodding channel had become UK(TV) Style. By the time that Better Homes jumped on the bandwagon, coupled with the then ubiquitousness of Ms Vorderman, it felt like saturation point.
I loved that kind of copycat programming, you don't get it so much these days, but Better Homes was the most brilliant example of ITV seeing a hit on another channel and just doing their own knock-off version of it. And then when Ground Force was a hit on BBC1, they did Better Gardens as well! Brilliantly shameless.
Better Homes and Better Gardens both did really well for ITV, though, because they were enough like Changing Rooms and Ground Force to fill the gap for viewers when the originals weren't on air. Airline was another one, it wasn't as good as Airport but it would do to pass the time. Doesn't work so much these days because the original shows are on so often nobody needs a replacement, hence the failure of ITV's endless variations on MasterChef and the ten million shows that are a bit like Gogglebox.