New identity for Scottish TV & Grampian TV

In most cases it was slightly different - in most regions the name lived on in the title of the regional news programme and on idents before regional shows. Grampian won't be on either and will so go down the Carlton/HTV/LWT route, and aside from news they don't really have their own channel anymore.

I thought everything was centralised in Glasgow, the only thing in Aberdeen IIRC is the production centre for Grampian News. Due to the distances involved that couldn't really move to Glasgow.

It doesn't save that much money, Scottish and Grampian are to all intents and puposes one TV station anyway. The only thing that is changing is the on screen branding.

It's a marketing and logistical thing - they can promote the whole shebang as 'STV' and those on air can call it 'STV'. It simplifies things immensely

I agree.

One of the most annoying things about Scottish TV / Grampian TV for the past few years is that although they have different on screen branding except for trails, they are coming from the same transmission desk and therefore have no branding from the announcers. Which is pointless.

A good move in my book.

Nothing really shocking and surprising about this News, it was more of a case of when it would happen. It just appears that SMG are doing what Carlton and Granada did 4 years ago in England and Wales.

Though on the Regional side it's good to see SMG haven't caved into ITV1 branding just yet, at least some form of Regional Identity will remain for the next couple of years.

That's a good point. I think we all know that ITV1 Scotland is a case of when not if.

Jonnie

The thing I find amusing is that for all its proclamations about this being good for the channel, SMG have conspicuously failed to muster the guts to simply name the channel "Scottish Television".

That they call it STV shows what a gutless shower of a company they really are.

I personally think this is a ploy to get ITV to pay SMG to just rename the station ITV1 Scotland. Not sure that it'll work, but I think that's what they are after.

And of course, on Scotsport they're still going to have to refer to "this channel" the whole time because the programme goes out on Border as well.

At present SMG only operate one TV channel in Scotland, it just has split regional news and happens to be branded as 'Scottish' or 'Grampian' depending on which part of the country you happen to be located in. Rebranding both stations to STV only acknowledges onscreen what has allready happened several years ago.

Is it right? Well it's another step towards an ITV plc which really will be able to pretend that a 'channel' called 'ITV1' operates over the entire country...'ITV1 Scotland' surely can't now be very far behind. This to me just seems like the Westcountry/Carlton/ITV1 rebranding which occured in the south west - it's a middle stage introduced as a pacifier to prevent too much backlash before the seemingly inevitable ITV1 branding appears.


I'd have to agree with you there Simon. In this brave new multichannel world, the one thing the old ITV system could offer is that it was *so* different, in that each part of the country had it's own regional TV station with autonomous local management, resourcing, and operation. It was a USP which no other broadcaster could offer. Centralisation can do nothing but make ITV look the same as everyone else - a company which operates a string of TV channels, nothing more. 10 years down the line, the short term gains that have been reaped by destroying the ITV Network are I feel going to end up being paid for - with ITV plc struggling to compete against a number of other broadcasters with the same structure as themselves, when if they weren't so greedy (although that is a fault of allowing consolodation to happen), they could have continued to offer a product which by definition no other company can match.

Scottish Television is far too long a title. Can you imagine wee Jeannie from Larkhall saying "Hey mum, what's on Scottish Television tonight?" She'll either say channel three, ITV or STV, so SMG are playing with their strongest brand. Plus - and I think it's what you're alluding to - calling it Scottish Television and taking over Grampian's area would just make it even clearer what is going on.

They're not going to. Apparently Studio A is now out of use already, and a date's already been set for demolition at Cowcaddens. Their new offices won't contain any large studios; if anything big's needing filmed, then they'll be renting from BBC Resources next door.

All Grampian is is Scottish with the text changed. Everything is almost exactly the same so they might as well change it. And both of them show horrible celebrity idents that went out the window ages ago. It's about time that it was changed. I'm fed up seeing the beginning of ITV1's 'Coming Next' screens appear on my TV for 1/2 a second before being cut out sharply by Grampian's one.

Dont forget the channel already has one brand at night with ''nighttime tv'' which came about very quietly a couple of years back without any great fass...in fact many did not notice. And at the minute everyone on air at smg is promoting programmes coming up ''on this channel'' which isolates viewers far more than the renaming and rebranding of one simple channel. However calling it stv may not be a good idea - it wont go down well with those losing gramplian.