Historical details of Central and other ITV Companies

One of the very last main pages is getting a nice tidy up, ( taken over a year to get many of the pages improved, what can you do. hopeful BBC One just needs some minor details from the 1970s and Southern could do a bit more improvements to its operation history anyways)

I have come across a few bits and bobs but nothing around which seems to back it up, Nothing in three national papers, nothing on line, nothing from books. Can anyone remember anything about the folowing:

* In 1986, Central established Television Sales and Marketing Services Ltd. (TSMS), a joint venture between itself and Anglia Television, another ITV broadcaster. The role of TSMS was to secure airtime sales and program sponsorships, in part to recover production costs. In addition, TSMS acted as consultant to international broadcasters like BBC Select, Nederland 1 in The Netherlands, and Westcountry.

* Central operated offices in London, New York, Sydney, and Hamburg. Besides functioning as news-gathering centers, these international bureaus also facilitated international sales and sponsorship of Central's programs.

* International Coproductions Central completed the 1988 Legacy of Civilization documentary series, made in conjunction with Maryland Public Television. Another series, Nuclear Age, was produced along with WGBH, a Boston-based public television station, and NHK, a Japanese broadcaster.

* In November 1991, Central purchased its rented headquarters in Birmingham and renamed it West Midlands Television Center. Also that year, Television Sales and Marketing Services acquired the airtime sales operation of Ulster Television in Northern Ireland.

* Central also refocused its business by severing ties with Chris Bearde Entertainment, a game show production house that had lost an estimated US$5 million, and Wordstar, a company providing newspapers and magazines with entertainment news worldwide.

* Zodiac, Central's USA program production subsidiary

it just seems strange certain parts of the history are missing,...

You probably have access to the IBA Yearbooks already, but if not, here's a scan for the Central page from 1988 — http://tig.gy/?m=IBA1988-Central.png

I don't have access to the IBA, So thank you for that very useful page!

You don't by chance have the IBA 1983 leaflet about Central East do you?

Sorry, that's really the only thing I have.

Its been extremely helpful!

It's interesting how a company once so mighty and important can be reduced to just 2 floors of office space in a small portion of a building once wholly occupied by them! And that's nothing to do with technology changing form!

Last pages of what?


TSMS ended up as a very big advertising sales house - one of two who sold nearly all TV airtime in the 90's I think. The only thing I remember is that they were based near the Hangar Lane Gyratory and where I worked at the time (a satellite channel) we were always waiting for them to send though the schedules!


Not really. Not everything that every company does is reported on publicly. Companies don't tend to have huge corporate history archives containing everything that goes on, though of course they would keep things like annual reports which would contain all the important stuff.

When a company is taken over a lot of company history is either made irrelevant or lost. Something like where Central had offices is of no use to anyone any more, the only place it might get a mention is in contemporary back copies of Broadcast or it's predecessor.

It happens though. Look at Pan Am... one of the world's biggest airlines and it's now just a few boxes in a warehouse!

TVS , Enron, woolworths, Safeways/Presto/lippens, But that shouldn't mean the history is forgotten about, Its like the history of UK even from 10th Century half the stuff is missing

Although technically, the current Pan Am has nothing to do with what was the largest airline, just the same name.

Yes, though I was talking about the original one that went bust in the early 90's, not the going concerns that use the same, or similar, names.

But as I say, if a company ceases to exist (either totally or as a seperate entity) then a lot of the things that happened in it's 'history' are just irrelevant. The only things that really need to be kept are financial and contractual and even then they expire after a while. Take Safeways for example, Morrisons will be interested in the performance history of a branch but not when the logo was changed outside or who the manager was in 1989


Well yes the same could probably be said of 99% of the history of life on earth.