GB News burst onto the UK media scene with a mission to disrupt a broadcasting market dominated for decades by the same players. Two years on, the free-to-air TV and radio channel has built a niche audience at the cost of staff turmoil and wary advertisers.
(Bloomberg) — GB News burst onto the UK media scene with a mission to disrupt a broadcasting market dominated for decades by the same players. Two years on, the free-to-air TV and radio channel has built a niche audience at the cost of staff turmoil and wary advertisers.
Backed by Dubai-based fund Legatum and British hedge fund manager Paul Marshall, the startup — created in September 2020 — attracted employees eager to build an insurgent challenger and amplify perspectives neglected by other news outlets.
After a rocky debut in June 2021, it has slowly gained some market share, peaking with a reach of 3.3 million in September, as people tuned in to track British political turmoil. Nigel Farage, former leader of the pro-Brexit UK Independence Party, hosts the channel’s most popular show.
However, persistent challenges threaten the uncertain commercial opportunity. The startup has yet to shake off an advertiser boycott and has struggled to keep key staff. In recent months, five presenters, at least five executive producers and other employees, including the head of digital and head of human resources, have left or are working through notice periods.
“Yes, we’ve got challenges in terms of revenue, but we don’t have challenges in terms of audience,” said Angelos Frangopoulos, GB News’s Chief Executive Officer. “And that is a significant signpost to us that we are making a difference.”
GB News Radio, which re-broadcasts the TV station’s audio, saw its weekly reach leap 50% to 415,000 between the second and third quarter of 2022, according to Radio Joint Audience Research. In November, the main TV channel reached about 2.5 million viewers, slightly ahead of the also-new competitor Talk TV, run by media mogul Rupert Murdoch, but far behind the 8.6 million boasted by Sky News and 11.2 million of BBC News, according to the Broadcasters’ Audience Research Board.
GB News executives and presenters have attended sales meetings to woo ad agencies, while a banner on GB News’s website urges them to “reconsider GB News.” Advertisers like furniture-maker IKEA and cider brand Kopparberg stepped back from the channel after launch, though one big brand which still advertises on GB News is Comcast Corp.’s Sky. A Sky spokesman said Sky Media has a commercial relationship with GB News selling the channel’s advertising, and that Sky advertises itself on the channel. IKEA AS and Kopparberg did not respond to requests for comment.
As some advertisers proved reluctant, Marshall and Legatum invested another £60 million ($72 million) in August. With deep-pocketed backers, and now that the initial startup costs have been paid, GB News could potentially run a lean operation for years. But Frangopoulos has said he’s using a “finite resource,” he told Bloomberg in an interview. GB News is not due to publish its annual accounts for the period it’s been on air until next month, according to UK rules.
GB News was founded by entrepreneurs Andrew Cole and Mark Schneider, with former BBC journalists Robbie Gibb and Andrew Neil. In early interviews, then-Chairman Neil said the channel aimed to challenge longstanding broadcasters like the BBC, drawing early comparisons to Murdoch’s Fox News. It was funded by US media group Discovery, alongside Marshall and Legatum.
That team has splintered. Gibb left for another role before the network went on air. Neil, who helped Murdoch start Sky TV, clashed with Frangopoulos and resigned weeks after launch, and his head of news and senior executive producer followed shortly afterward. In August, Cole and Schneider sold their stakes, as did Discovery, which reviewed its portfolio as part of its merger with Warner Bros., reporting a 60% loss on its £20 million investment the following month.
“I am very happy with my investment in GB News, which is doing everything that a good startup should: disrupting the market, serving a genuine customer need, and growing strongly,” Marshall said in an email. Co-founder Andrew Cole said by email he left because of time commitments at another of his startups, but he remains a supporter of the channel. Investor Legatum referred questions to GB News.
The company has about 250 employees, a spokeswoman said, and has recently hired comedian John Cleese and Daily Mail columnist Andrew Pierce as contributors.
But the newsroom has experienced staff disquiet and high turnover, with divisions over content contributing to some exits. Bloomberg News spoke to two dozen current and former employees, who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak to the press.
GB News has negotiated settlements with three former employees, and according to a court representative is being sued by a fourth at the Central London Employment Tribunal.
Frangopoulos confirmed there was a preliminary employment tribunal hearing in the one matter. He declined to comment on the settlements nor any other individual staff matters, but said “there are no outstanding grievances or allegations that I’m aware of.”
Off-air controversies triggered by provocateur presenters have caused internal tension. In June, GB News contributor Laurence Fox tweeted an image of a swastika made of LGBTQ pride flags. Fox’s tweet drew condemnation from the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, which described it as “vile.” Another GB News presenter replied with a ‘laughing’ emoji and the exchange contributed to an employee’s decision to leave, according to five people familiar with the matter.
Fox was given a permanent show in November. In an email responding to Bloomberg, Fox said he should post the offending image again, then did so on Twitter, before deleting it the same day. GB News said he was making a satirical point, not a hateful one, and that he took down the posts in line with its social media policy.
Still, some presenter behavior has prompted swift action: Guto Harri was suspended after taking the knee — a stance that has become a statement against racism — on air in solidarity with the England football team, after they received racist abuse.
Like other news operations in the UK, GB News is overseen by British regulator Ofcom. GB News Radio re-broadcasts audio from the TV, but this multimedia approach breached rules after candidates for an election had their names shown on screen but the presenter failed to read them all out, the regulator reported in a public notice.
“The radio issue was a very technical breach and happened in the early days of our ground-breaking dual platform broadcast,” Frangopoulos said. “We have learned from that, and radio is now fully integrated into everything we do.”
An Ofcom spokeswoman also said it is running two investigations into presenter Mark Steyn’s coverage of vaccine safety, and it’s assessing whether to investigate a third segment about Covid-19, which aired Dec. 5. A judge also criticized a GB News presenter’s monologue about an active trial during court proceedings in Bristol crown court in late 2021, The Guardian newspaper reported.
“If Ofcom finds us in breach at any point, then we will take that on board and act appropriately and read any judgments that come through and acknowledge the judgment,” Frangopoulos said. In 2021, Ofcom completed 28 investigations and found 17 breaches of its rules across the sector, according to its annual report. Breaches can end in a warning, a fine, or in extreme cases removal of the license to broadcast.
Frangopoulos remained confident GB News would overcome the internal upheaval. “We had a very open and transparent re-structure,” he said. “We are a startup and we have to iterate. Naturally, some people have left.”
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