RTÉ Call for Ideas | Lifestyle

Thu 29th October 2015



Mid-week Lifestyle

RTÉ have 3 available slots for Lifestyle Programmes in the Summer and Autumn of 2016.

RTÉ are looking for:

  • Great Presenters – a perennial, we want the next Dermot Bannon, Eva Orsmonde and Francis Brennan.  Presenters with credibility, big personalities and a good sense of fun.  We cannot overemphasise the value of good experts.  A show can be invented around almost any subject matter if the expert is good enough.
  • Programmes that feel real, that follow stories over time like Operation Transformation and At Your Service.  
  • Style – we need programmes to feel fresh and contemporary.  Formats should never feel like poor relations of UK counterparts.
  • Observational series, and these can be of shorter than 6 episodes.  The Shelbourne, The Gleneagle and Garda Down Under all worked well in this slot.  Are there other areas that could be of interest and can you convince us that your subject and characters would appeal to a large and broad audience?

RTÉ are Open to

  •  Fixed rig formats and to ways of telling stories that are informed by fixed rig style, i.e.  the naturalism that this technology has given viewers access to.
  • Hybrid formats that combine take-away for information hungry viewers, with stories to engage and add depth.

While no subject area is out of bounds,producers should be aware of recent series commissioned or developed. These include -You Should Really See a Doctor, a new general medical series for transmission in November 2015; The Shelbourne, Series 2 for November 2015, a Consumer Food Show ; Home of the Year 2 and a Personal Finance series. We are also in development with a Restaurant make-over series with Dylan McGrath for a post-watershed slot.

Producers also need to be aware that these programmes must play to a large and diverse audience. They must have the kind of broad appeal that maximizes their ability to deliver a Fair City audience into the Nine O’clock News.

Transmission: Mid-week 20.30, Summer 2016 and September 2016.

Duration: 3 Series of 6*25 minutes

Budget: 40k - up maximum of 50k

Deadline: 12 pm Friday 27th of November

Submit ideas into the eCommissioning system: e-commissioning.rte.ie under the programme category "Daytime & Lifestyle Midweek 20.30 – Summer & September 2016" - Deadline: 12 pm Friday 27th of November (Strict Deadline)