'Filthy Rich and Homeless'.
Blackfella Films’ innovative social experiment in which five wealthy people swapped privilege for poverty underpinned a strong performance for SBS documentary, news and current affairs programming in the first half.
Broadcast at 8.30pm on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday last week, Filthy Rich and Homeless achieved a combined average audience of 474,000 for each of the three episodes.
The series was SBS’s highest performing documentary for the year thus far among the 25-54 demographic in that timeslot, with shares of 9.5 per cent, 8.8 per cent and 9.9 per cent.
The Filthy Rich and Homeless Live program, which brought back the participants after the final episode for a live studio discussion about the issues explored, registered SBS’s highest metro share for the year in its timeslot, with a combined average audience of 477,000.
The series achieved a total reach of 1.65 million people (overnight, metro and regional combined), including 717,000 aged 25-54.
Overall, SBS’s primary channel increased its primetime share among metro audiences for the year from 4.8 per cent to 5.1 per cent while the share for the SBS Network (including SBS, SBS Viceland, Food Network and NITV) rose from 6.7 per cent to 7 per cent.
“SBS has had a great 2017 so far with a truly distinctive slate, bucking industry trends to increase our share in a challenging market. With a compelling line-up still to come, we are looking forward to continuing to build on this momentum over the coming months,” Marshall Heald, SBS director of TV and online, told IF.
“We were really pleased to bring the first half of 2017 to a close with Filthy Rich and Homeless which drew strong audiences for SBS over three consecutive nights and ignited an important national discussion about Australia’s homelessness crisis.”
Meanwhile SBS World News boosted its audience share in the first half, with the 6.30 pm bulletin averaging a 3.8 per cent metro share (up from 3.5 per cent for the same period last year) and the late night broadcast with a 3.5 per cent metro share (up from 2.9 per cent).
The Tuesday night current affairs line-up with Insight’s reports on topics as diverse as life after competitive sport, the custom of dowry in Australia and mental health, increased its metro audience share by 1.1 points to 6.4 per cent. Dateline’s share was up by 0.5 points to 5 per cent.
SBS On Demand, which offers more than 6,000 hours of premium content from around the world for free, saw average monthly video views jump by more than 50 per cent in the first half, driven by dramas such as Vikings, Midnight Sun, The Young Pope, and The Night Manager.
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