14 DAY TRIAL // Virgin Media has announced that it will be sponsoring the eighth series of Channel4's reality show Big Brother, after mobile operator Orange chose not to back up the controversial program.
Just last week, Orange voted on whether it should take the place of Carphone Warehouse in sponsoring Big Brother or not. The result was a firm 'no'.
Carphone Warehouse chose to end its sponsorship of Big Brother after the Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty was bullied by fellow contestants and around 46,000 viewers submitted complaints to media regulator Ofcom over the alleged abuse. Thus, Carphone Warehouse considered that with all the 'huge publicity' it was best to give up sponsoring BigBrother.
'We asked our staff what they thought about sponsoring Big Brother as we like to get them involved in the decisions their company makes. In this case, the majority of our staff felt that we shouldn't sponsor Big Brother. Having taken this into consideration and having evaluated it further with our sponsorship team, we have declined this opportunity,' said an Orange spokesperson.
Considering this, Virgin Media was the next in line that could choose whether to sponsor Big Brother or not, and they chose to do so. James Kydd, Virgin Media's managing director of marketing, said: "We're a pioneering and innovative company so it made sense to create an alliance with a show that has genuinely changed the face of TV."
"Virgin is known for facing challenges head on and we know that our customers enjoy Big Brother because it's the most unpredictable and exciting TV programme there is."
Channel 4's head of sponsorship, David Charlesworth, said: "We share so much with Virgin in both brand and business so look forward to pooling our expertise to create a groundbreaking sponsorship."