Love Island cancellation 'could cost ITV £100 million'

By Neil Wilkes, Editor-in-chief

Published: May 5 2020 | 19:49

Last updated: May 6 2020 | 23:48

An industry experts warns that the commercial impact of cancelling Love Island could be a cost as high as £100m.

The commercial impact of ITV cancelling this summer's series of Love Island could be as high as £100 million, according to an industry expert.

After weeks of speculation over whether the show could go ahead due to the coronavirus pandemic, the broadcaster officially confirmed its cancellation yesterday, having concluded that "logistically it's just not possible" to go ahead.

The show is ITV2's most popular series and last year averaged 5.6 million viewers across its eight-week run, bringing in significant revenue from advertising.

"The ITV team could be losing out on between £85m-£100m based on TV ads and wider commercial deals that ITV would have been able to capitalise on during being on air," retail expert Andy Bar told Metro.

"This is based on last year's estimated revenue of £77m, and I think it would have, conservatively, gone up this year by a minimum of 10% taking it to £84m just on TV advertisements alone.

"This doesn't include the wider commercial deals such as in-app (ITV) sponsorships, so the ad cost will have gone up."

Following the cancellation of Love Island, attention will now turn to whether I'm A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here can still go ahead as planned this November.