Award-winning factual producer Proper Content is set to shutter amid tough market conditions.
Founder David DeHaney, who set up the company in 2016, announced the decision to cease trading and appoint an administrator on Thursday.
“This has been a very difficult decision,” says DeHaney. “We have had nearly 10 years of making some of the industry’s most talked-about shows; entertaining programmes with social purpose. And that is exactly what I set out to do. But we want to do more, so much more, and the current environment does not support us in making that step-change.”
Proper Content, one of the industry’s few Black-led independents, was known for a wide-range of factual content ranging from recent BBC documentary “P Diddy: Rise and Fall” to royal docuseries “The King’s Guard” for Channel 5, which ran for two seasons, to the multi-award winning Channel 4 show “The School That Tried to End Racism,” which took home a BAFTA, a Venice TV Award, a Rose d’Or and a Grierson Award.
Despite growing the company to a turnover of £6 million ($8 million) the economic landscape proved too tough to continue.
“We are extremely proud of what we have achieved with Proper Content,” said DeHaney. “We have held up a lens to society in so many different ways, and to such a variety of audiences. As a growing indie, we couldn’t have done more. Yet, for a company like ours, at this stage in its development, going to the next stage is incredibly challenging. There simply isn’t the commissioning risk, or the time or space to let companies stretch their wings in new ways. And, as a result, companies get ‘stuck’ – which doesn’t feel like a good, or a creative place to be.”
“We have achieved what we have achieved despite this,” he added. “It is not the central reason for our decision. We feel we have so much more to offer and aren’t fulfilling that potential. That is why we are closing. The reality is that the market has changed dramatically in recent years. Commissioning budgets have tightened, development cycles have lengthened and the opportunities for growing indies to scale have become increasingly limited. Those pressures have affected many companies across the sector and have undoubtedly contributed to the position we find ourselves in today.”
“My priority at the moment is continuing to work proactively with our freelancers and staff, as well as our broadcasting customers and collaborators, to ensure that the closure has as little impact as possible. I wanted to say a heartfelt thank you to everyone who has worked with and supported us over the last decade. Together we have told some incredible stories, built a remarkable company and achieved far more than I could ever have imagined when we started in 2016.
“While Proper Content is coming to an end, my passion for storytelling and creating ambitious new projects remains undiminished. I am excited about what comes next.”
As well as a downturn in commissioning budgets that has roiled the industry over the past three years, the U.K. – like other major markets – is grappling with a surge of consolidation, from the recent Banijay/All3Media merger to the ongoing acquisition of public-service broadcaster ITV by Sky and Warner-Bros. Discovery, which owns a number of free-to-air and pay networks in the U.K., being bought by Channel 5 owner Paramount.
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