[chris]

It's known as a 'corporate image'. Banks don't have different signage at their branches, any more than BBC regional news programmes want to have different persona for their viewers.

People actually travel around for business purposes or on breaks in the UK, so they would view different regional programmes. I guess it's good to see something familiar.

I don’t think every branch of NatWest has the same dimensions and identical layout….

The brand is the signature elements of BBC News - red, globe, pips - not a 5x3 meter box. Are you suggesting someone watching the News Channel thinks it’s a different product because the desk is round and there’s no red sofa?

As has been mentioned numerous times before, having consistency between regions makes considerable cost savings and efficiencies...

Consistent training for staff, consistent graphic templates and designs which can be shared across regional hubs, consistent set up for operation in the gallery (especially once every region's gallery is updated), general consistent cost as the kit is identical each time, consistent in terms of long-term maintenance... plus much more.

The regions are already having to put out the same quantity of output but with much less (both in terms of money and staff). Further efficiencies are coming so whilst it would be nice for pres fans to have numerous different sets designs and tweaks.... the funds (and staff!) are simply not there these days. Every region will have fewer people getting the show to air... fewer camera crew, fewer gallery staff, fewer people available to design graphics in a short turnaround. Sharing expertise and resource across each region is going to be more and more important as the cuts continue to hit.

As these sets consist of approximately 90% video wall, it will also mean that if branding is changed, it's quick and simple to implement to every region very quickly. Quite a bit of money has been spent with the LED (it could have been vastly reduced) but this was to ensure that all regions are future proofed for many years to come.

I’m not saying every set should be a totally different design and I’m also not naïve to cost cutting - as someone who works in TV production and facing squeezed budgets - but I’m not convinced allowing the sets use the most of their space would vastly impact templates and maintenance.

In fact, it’s been done - Scotland and Northern Ireland have different sized and designed versions of the set. It’s a shame regions with larger spaces aren’t given opportunity to use it.


Final point from me - why have some of these sets got static imagery? It was very obvious on the late bulletin where the water doesn’t move.