I hope this letter finds you in good health, which I'm sure it does due to the well documented sum of money that has recently landed in your account. I'm writing today to make public my thoughts on your new contract with Channel 4 and The Great British Bake Off. I have left it a short while before writing this response to the news in the hope that the dust would settle and I would adjust to the idea, but the fact is I haven't. I know that everything has seen sorted and that the thoughts of one disgruntled individual are not going to change anything but I think that the audience are just as important in the creation of a television programme as the people behind it, so this is my right to reply.
You see, Bake Off wasn't just an hour of entertainment a week for a few months a year to me, it was the highlight of my calendar. It was the conversations I had with friends, with customers, with strangers online. It was the planning of my schedule around Wednesday evenings. It was the reason for my supermarket trips for ingredients on a Tuesday and the joy of baking myself every week so that my household could nibble along together as we watched. It was all these things and more, and I say "was" because, the way I see it, this is the end of Bake Off. You may argue that nothing will change when you switch over to your new home, but it is clear to me that everything will change. One silver haired, blue eyed judge does not a Bake Off make. Yes, in name GBBO will stay the same, but there's no way it can in spirit.
I was beginning to lose faith in television, or if not faith then interest. Drama and comedy continue to bring the goods, but more and more have the schedules become overrun with questionable talent and reality shows that have had me switching off. They just weren't inspiring - I was never going to be a popstar or dancer or dog magician, but a baker I could be. I don't think I'd realised until now how much of an influence Bake Off has been on me, but in the last few years baking has become one of my main hobbies and that's no coincidence. It's something to put in a twitter bio, it's what I do when I need cheering up, it's what makes me browse Lakeland with the enthusiasm of a middleaged housewife (I wholeheartedly apologise for the stereotyping). I worry now about how this move will impact on bakers of the future. May it won't, maybe it will, but who else can inspire them like Queen Mary Berry? At least Bake Off remains on an all access channel, and I suppose that's something.
Channel 4, I suppose, is the next best alternative to the BBC. An ITV Bake Off would have been difficult to adjust to and a move to Channel 5, unforgivable. Don't get me started on Sky, or anything else that requires a subscription. I am beginning to see how GBBO will fit with the Channel 4 schedule and we're all racking our brains to come up with a new set of presenters from their already filled books (please not Kirstie and Phil), but however preferable C4 is, it's not the BBC. You may say that Bake Off was never the Beeb's for the taking, but while it may not belong to them, it certainly belongs with them. You must be able to see that nothing is more BBC than baking in a tent.
But, no matter what we all think and say, it was about the money, wasn't it? It's always about the money. £25 million per year. PER YEAR! (and let's not forget the three year contract, so it's essentially £75 million). It's nothing more than greed. Bake Off was already the biggest show on television so it's not like it needed any more funding. Sure, the cost of sugar might be rising and those Kitchen Aid's don't come cheap, but we know it was just about lining your pockets. At first when I heard about Mel and Sue, and later Queen Mary, I was gutted but now I have gained another level of respect for them. Unlike you and a certain Mr Hollywood (it always was going to be him, wasn't it?), they have moral fibre, they weren't "going with the dough". Their leaving is the slap in the face you needed, and may I say it serves you right. I am not the first to make this observation, but do you realise you've essentially got a £75 million tent? Seems a bit silly, doesn't it?
And I think my final question is this: why now? Why now as in, why move at all, but more specifically why now? Why announce in the middle of a series? While I still adore the show and will savour every moment of it in its rightful home, everything now seems bittersweet. Mel and Sue didn't know it was their last #BreadWeek when they made their closing bun pun and Mary didn't know about her final Soggy Bottom. They didn't have the opportunity to film a final goodbye and yet you've also stopped us from enjoying the restive the series without a pang of sadness. Couldn't your announcement have waited?
As I say, I know my little voice won't make any difference and that it's very much a done deal but I couldn't sit on my thoughts any longer. I know I've not added anything new to the discussion but emphasising a point never hurt, did it? I would like to say that I'm so cross that I'll never watch again, but we all know I will. There's no disputing the fact that you know how to make good television and new-look GBBO will probably do well on Channel 4, but it will never be the Bake Off that I've known and loved.
As a chid I always thought it was worse when a parent or teacher was disappointed in you rather than angry with you, and I so I will close this letter not as an angry viewer, but a disappointed one.
Yours,
Georgia Stephenson
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