Its beaches, hotels and romance on Discovery Travel and Living

Special interest channels such as Discovery and National Geographic Channel have made repeated attempts to increase appointment viewing with special programming initiatives. Now it’s the turn of Discovery’s lifestyle channel, Discovery Travel and Living, to experiment with the genre.

The channel has lined up theme-based weeks on various subjects such as beaches, hotels, cuisine, health, fashion and romance. Starting December 26, the channel will air these shows 9-10 pm every week day.

Aditya P Tripathi, vice-president, Lifestyle, Discovery Communications, India, says, “In the first year of its operationsw, Discovery Travel and Living has explained the concept of lifestyle to people. And now with these ‘Theme Weeks’, we hope to increase appointment viewing on the channel. This is why we have scheduled these shows in a particular time slot so that they become a habit with the viewers.”

He adds, “One of the biggest problems with a channel like ours is that the viewers are unaware about the programme schedule. This is why we plan to run promos of the following episodes and themes after each day’s episode.”

Besides, the channel has lined up a few weekend programmes such as ‘American Casino’ (Sundays, 8 pm) and ‘Kings of the Road’ (Saturdays, 9 pm). While ‘American Casino’ tries to prove that running a billion-dollar casino is anything but a game, ‘Kings of the Road’ talks about motorcycles, the ‘pony car’ and the life of truck drivers.

Targeted at upscale professionals and couples, the channel plans to go in for massive advertising through the English press and its network channels.

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