Nine’s new-look Today breakfast show a ratings fizzer

Nine’s hotly-anticipated Today breakfast show was watched by just 196,652 viewers across the five metropolitan cities.

The new Channel 9 Today Show hosts on their first day. (L-R) Brooke Boney, Tony Jones, Deb Knight, Georgie Gardner and Tom Steinfort.

The debut of Nine’s hotly anticipated new-look Today breakfast show yesterday was a fizzer.

Today, which now boasts two female television co-hosts Deborah Knight and Georgie Gardner and a new supporting cast of journalists, was watched by 196,652 viewers across the five metropolitan cities, according to ozTAM’s overnight figures.

That’s sharply down from the average of 235,000 viewers a day during the working week last year, with Gardner and then co-host Karl Stefanovic.

Today’s staunch rival Sunrise, which is co-hosted by David Koch and Samantha Armytage, was watched by 266,469 people on Seven across the cities.

Some 137,287 people watched ABC’s TV breakfast show and news bulletins across the cities yesterday.

Yesterday’s breakfast television ratings.

Today fared badly in Melbourne, despite the program kicking-off yesterday at 530am at the hugely-popular Australian Open tennis tournament. Some 40,624 viewers tuned in to watch Today, compared to 70,552 people that watched Sunrise.

After the poor start, Nine executives face an uphill battle attracting back Today viewers. But they still have time to make changes as the 2019 TV ratings years doesn’t kick off until February 10.

The show’s ratings fell throughout 2018, largely due to the rising unpopularity of Stefanovic, whose love life became salacious tabloid gossip.

Nine declined to comment on the ratings numbers, referring to its statement on Monday.

Steven Burling, Nine’s director of morning TV, yesterday said that “it was an extremely positive first morning with our new team.”

“There are always challenges when producing an outside broadcast of this size and duration and our on-air team wonderfully covered any early hiccups our production team may have experienced behind the scenes.

“We know this is a long game and we will continue every day to work hard and improve across the board to provide our audience with the best show we can each and every day.”

John Choueifate, former executive director of news at Network 10, had mixed views about the first show.

“I thought the set was fresh and clean. The content was a bit ordinary,” he told The Australian.

Mr Choueifate said Melbourne’s evening newsreader, Peter Hitchener, “added nothing during his segment” with other panelists as they reviewed the newspaper headlines.

“There was no love and warmth, It was all too ‘mechanical’. There appeared to be a lot of nerves,” said Mr Choueifate, adding that the show’s newly appointed newsreader, Tom Steinfort was “fumbling his way through.”

Steinfort replaced Sylvia Jeffreys, the wife of Peter Stefanovic, who left the broadcaster last year after 15 years in various roles.

Today’s new team also includes, Melbourne sports presenter Tony Jones, Nine finance editor Ross Greenwood and former ABC journalist and Triple J newsreader Brooke Boney as entertainment reporter. Boney replaced long-serving entertainment reporter Richard Wilkinson on the show.

Karl Stefanovic will continue to host Nine’s reality show This Time Next Year, and has two years left on his $2 million-a-year contract with the broadcaster. But there have been some recent media reports that Nine executives want him gone by Easter.

The Today show is important to Nine, which is looking to sell no-core assets and extract annual cost savings of $65 million following its $4.2 billion merger with Fairfax Media last month, because it’s a fairly big revenue earner.

Advertising on the breakfast shows is worth about $120 million a year, and also kick-starts the day, driving viewers into the network’s program schedule.

Nine’s chief executive Hugh Marks is keen to sell the events business inherited from the Fairfax merger, as well as its regional operations and New Zealand business, Stuff. He is also looking to mop up the shares that Nine doesn’t currently own in Macquarie Media, home of 2GB’s radio stars Alan Jones and Ray Hadley.

At present, Nine owns 54.4 per cent of Macquarie Media, while advertising executive John Singleton has a 32.3 per cent stake and the rest by minority shareholders.