HD Ratings: House Rules Broken?

TV3’s season premiere of House Rules on Wednesday failed to live up to its title.

The Aussie reality hit bombed spectacularly against TV2’s kitchen wizard of Oz, My Kitchen Rules.

The shockingly low-rating bow highlights the risks of going head to head with an established hit already well into its run — a lesson TV3 doesn’t appear to have learned from its The Great Food Face-vs-MasterChef NZ gambit.

Launching 7.30 Wednesday always was going to be a big ask even for House Rules, given it’s a traditionally low-rating slot because of the comedies TV2 historically has aired at that hour.

But even TV3 programmers will be surprised by the overnight results, with House Rules mustering a meagre 2.6% – 3.8% of the key demographics — which was even less than its lead-in, Campbell Live.

At the same time, an extra-long episode of HD rival MKR scored a season high of 16.1% – 23.2%.

Even TV One’s alternative fared better than House Rules: Rapid Response averaged 4.4% – 7.9% and Fair Go, 3.4% – 5.8%.

However, TV3 can take some comfort from House Rules’ audience building over the hour and lead-out 3rd Degree having one of its better weeks, with 5.2% – 6.9%, helping Bouncers to bounce back with 4.2% – 4.9%.

That was bad news for TV One’s HD dramas: House Husbands averaged only 1.3% – 4.5% and Nashville’s second episode (left), 1.4% – 3.4%.

Despite a solid premiere and a week of excellent reviews, the country-and-western drama dipped at least a point in all the key demos.

It was a casualty of TV2’s MKR juggernaut, which helped to generate top ratings for lead-out 2 Broke Girls (9.9% – 14.1%) and 9.30 drama Once Upon a Time (5.5% – 8.9%).

By dominating from Shortland Street (13.1% – 20.3%) to Supernatural (2.2% – 5.1%), TV2 ruled the night in all the key demos.

Yet despite TV2 topping shares of 40% in the 18-39 and household shoppers with kids demos, week-on-week the other channels were steady and even improved their ratings in some demos.

Wednesday’s peak-hour HD channel ratings and shares were:

• A18-49: TV One, 5.2 rating/18.3 share; TV2, 10.6 rating/37.4 share; TV3, 4.2 rating/15.0 share
• A18-39: TV One, 3.9 rating/11.3 share; TV2, 11.3 rating/40.9 share; TV3, 4.6 rating/16.4 share
• A25-54: TV One, 6.3 rating/19.1 share; TV2, 11.4 rating/34.3 share; TV3, 5.4 rating/16.2 share
• HHS/k: TV One, 6.7 rating/17.8 share; TV2, 15.5 rating/41.5 share; TV3, 6.1 rating/16.3 share.