5 July 2021
UKTV has announced Cherie Cunningham as the new channel director for its award-winning comedy entertainment channel Dave.
Dave is one of the biggest non-PSB channels in the UK reaching 20 million viewers every month. Cherie is tasked with growing the channel's viewership and continuing to establish its reputation as the home of brand-new, award-winning comedy entertainment from the biggest and brightest stars.
Cherie takes over from Luke Hales who left the business last month and she'll report to Steve North, the broadcaster's genre general manager for comedy and entertainment.
Steve said:
Cherie has been a key member of the Dave team for several years and I'm incredibly pleased she is now taking on the channel director role. Her exceptional leadership skills, coupled with her extensive marketing knowledge and understanding of how to grow brands makes her perfectly positioned to take Dave to the next stage of its journey.
Cherie added:
What a role! I'm so thrilled and energised to be taking on this position. Dave is a challenger brand and I'm committed to ensuring we surprise and excite audiences over the coming months and years by supplying non-stop creativity, content and innovation. We've had an incredible success rate with new and returning UKTV Original commissions, we've landed brilliant purpose driven work with CALM, and as a brand, Dave has bags of personality. So with all that in mind, the future looks set to be very exciting!
UKTV recently unveiled a slate of brand-new UKTV Original series for Dave, all due to air later this year. Those include, British as Folk with Darren Harriott, Fern Brady and Ivo Graham, Richard Ayoade's Question Team, David Mitchell's Outsiders, and The Island, hosted by Tom Allen with Jason Forbes and Kemah Bob. The multi-channel broadcaster also just announced five short-form comedy series for Dave's social media channels including a YouTube spin-off of the BAFTA & RTS-nominated Big Zuu's Big Eats. Also, following the standout success of series one, Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable will be returning to the channel with a second series.
About Cherie
Cherie joined UKTV in 2016 and became head of marketing for Dave and W in 2019. During her time at the broadcaster, she has been integral in growing UKTV's channels and programmes with marketing campaigns and has successfully launched the likes of Taskmaster, Dave's critically acclaimed and BAFTA-winning series, Hypothetical, one of Dave's most-watched shows, and cult sci-fi series, Red Dwarf, to name a few. She also established the long-term partnership with CALM (Campaign Against Living Miserably) to drive awareness and fundraising via marketing, podcasts and merchandise to support mental health and suicide prevention.
In Q1 this year, Cherie and her team launched a brand campaign for Dave highlighting the huge range of new shows on the channel and reiterating the channel's uniquely witty tone of voice. It featured UKTV Originals including, Meet the Richardsons, Hypothetical and Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable and contributed to a rise in 16-34s tuning in (20% more compared with the same period last year).
Prior to UKTV, Cherie worked in both strategic and creative roles at Sky, Nickelodeon and Sony Pictures Entertainment, and led the channel brand strategy for Sky 1, launching programmes including, A League of Their Own, 24 and An Idiot Abroad.
Cherie is a 2021 Marketing Academy scholar currently taking part in a nine-month leadership programme which involves mentoring, coaching and lectures delivered by top CEOs, CMOs and business leaders from the UK.
For more information, please contact:
Ali Laurie, Senior Publicist, UKTV
About Dave
Sky 111/811, Virgin 127/194, Freesat 157, Freeview, BT & TalkTalk 19, Freesat 157
Dave Ja Vu: Sky 211, Virgin 211, Freeview 23, BT & TalkTalk 23
On demand on Sky, Virgin and UKTV Play
About UKTV
UKTV has been at the forefront of branded television for over 25 years, entertaining the nation with programmes they love. Its leading brands - Dave, Gold, W, Drama, Alibi, Eden and Yesterday - span comedy, entertainment, natural history, factual and drama, and are delivered to audiences through UKTV Play, Freeview, Sky, Virgin Media, BT, TalkTalk, YouView, Freesat and Amazon Fire. The broadcaster is a significant investor in British creativity and is committed to working with new and established writers, directors and programme-makers.
UKTV is part of BBC Studios, the UK's most-awarded production company, a world-class distributor with international branded services, and a commercial subsidiary of the world's leading public service broadcaster, the BBC.